


Welcome to the madhouse

by Scottiedog17



Category: Formula 1 RPF, Formula 2 RPF, Formula 3 RPF, Formula E RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Best Friends, Childhood Friends, F/F, F/M, M/M, Some angst here and there, there are also group chats in this as well, there is a lot of drama in supermarkets
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:20:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 34,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27087004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scottiedog17/pseuds/Scottiedog17
Summary: Honstely, this whole school is a mess. It really shouldn't be, but yet it is. There's the ongoing fight between the french and maths teachers. There's a fight in the AH french class between two students. S6s are having life meltdowns over Unis, and their futures. The S5s are a chaotic bunch, and the pain of Nat 5s is dawning on the S4s. Two teachers are clearly in love, Claire is regretting her life choices in becoming sixth form year head, and all in honesty, half of the students and teachers are questioning why they even came here in the first place.
Relationships: Alexander Albon/Lily Muni He, André Lotterer/Jean-Eric Vergne, António Félix da Costa/Robin Frijns, Arthur Leclerc/Gianluca Petecof, Caterina Masetti Zannini/Charlotte Siné, Daniel Ricciardo/Max Verstappen, Esteban Ocon/Lance Stroll, Lewis Hamilton/Sebastian Vettel, Marcus Armstrong/Callum Ilott, Mick Schumacher/Robert Shwartzman, Mitch Evans/Alex Lynn, Nicholas Latifi/George Russell, Oscar Piastri/Logan Sargeant, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Pierre Gasly/Charles Leclerc, Sacha Fenestraz/Lando Norris, Susie Wolff/Torger "Toto" Wolff, Tatiana Calderón/Jamie Chadwick
Comments: 23
Kudos: 31





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone. So because it seems I can't stop myself with all these different ideas I'm having, I've decided to do another one. I've had this mind for a while, and I've decided to go for it. I've enjoyed writing the few shots already. This is basically if the F1, F2, F3 and FE drivers were teachers and students at a Scottish high school. They are all separate and there isn't an ongoing story between them.  
> The reason why its Scottish is because I'm Scottish, and this in large part is based on mine and friends' experiences at school.  
> I figured it would be quite helpful if I explained a few key areas of the Scottish schooling system as I'm sure that not everybody who reads this, will understand all of the schooling sides.  
> I've included this down below, along with a list of everyone's years if they are a student or if they are a teacher. It gets more interesting, I promise. I just thought it would be helpful.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Scottie Dog

Some basic Scottish Schooling facts,

  1. School is broken down into primary and secondary. Primary runs from P1 when you start school to P7. In Scotland, we have an extra year in primary school compared to the rest of the UK, so we are 12 when we leave primary school.
  2. Secondary goes from S1 to S6. The final two years are the sixth form. Sometimes they are still referred to as S5 and S6, or lower and upper Six. It depends on the school.
  3. We sit different exams compared to the rest of the UK. We sit Nat 5s at 16. It is a two-year course that runs over S3 and S4. It's the Scottish version of GCSEs.
  4. We then have Highers and Advanced Highers. These are both one-year courses across the sixth form. You generally sit five highers and then three advanced highers.
  5. The good thing about highers being a one year course is that you apply for university with these results at the start of S6.
  6. You go through a UK wide system called UCAS, where you apply for five universities. Then there are two types of offers you can get.
  7. The first type is an unconditional. This tends to be for Scottish universities. You already meet the requirements for the universities, so you don't have to get any required grades in your exams that year.
  8. The other is a conditional, where you get the offer but you have to get specific grades in your exams. That was the case with me, whilst some of my friends got unconditionals.
  9. If you are registered as living in Scotland, and you go to uni in Scotland, you get your fees paid for by the Scottish government. 
  10. Year heads are basically a teacher who has the role of looking after one of the years and making sure that everything is going ok in terms of work, and most often friendship issues.



* * *

S6- The boys

  * Alex Albon
  * George Russell
  * Lando Norris
  * Pierre Gasly
  * Charles Leclerc
  * Sacha Fenestraz
  * Esteban Ocon
  * Lance Stroll



The girls

  * Charlotte Sine
  * Caterina Masetti Zannini
  * Dilara Sanlik
  * Lily Muni



S5-

  * Callum Illot
  * Mick Schumacher
  * Robert Shwartzman
  * Marcus Armstrong
  * Christian Lungaard
  * Guanyu Zhou
  * Juan Manuel Correa
  * Jüri Vips
  * Nick De Vries
  * Jamie Chadwick
  * Tatiana Calderón



S4-

  * Logan Sargent
  * Oscar Pistari
  * Arthur Leclerc
  * Fredrick Vesti
  * Gianluca Petecof
  * Enzo Fittipaldi



Nobody in S3 

S2-

  * Dino Beganovic
  * Sebastian Montya



Nobody in S1

Teachers-

Cyril Abiteboul- French and form teacher for S6A

Christian Horner- Maths and form teacher for S6R

Toto Wolff- Business and form teacher for S6M

Zac Brown- Business and form teacher for S6L

Andreas Seildi- Economics and form teacher for S6L

Mattio Binotto- and form teacher for S6F

Sebastian Vettel- Modern studies and form teacher for S5P

Lewis Hamilton- English and head of careers

Claire Williams- Sociology and head of sixth form (S5 and S6)

André Lotterer- German and head of S4

Jean Eric Vergne (JEV)- French

Fernando Alonso- Spanish and form teacher for S5A

Susie Wolff- Maths and head of S3

Student teachers-

Stoffel Vandoorne

Robin Frijns,

Antionio Felix De Costa

Alex Lynn

Mitch Evans

More characters will be added, in all three areas.


	2. UCAS, Unis and Teacher beef

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Its January, some people have got thier uni responses and some haven't. George is one of those people who hasn't got his yet and he's slightly worried. There is now also the small issue that Mr Hamiliton and Mr Vettel clearly like each other. Much like how Mr Abiteboul and Mr Horner don't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi,   
> So I've written all of these and I'm posting them all at once, because why not?  
> So UCAS, it's one of the most annoying things in life. You send everything off in November/December, and your You send everything off still waiting for uni to tell you if you have a place or not. Also, dissertations are not fun either.  
> Feel free to leave comments, I like reading them.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you all enjoy.  
> Scottie Dog. xx

“Alright big lad, glad to see you’ve braced us with your presence. How the hell did you manage to pull that one off then?”

George rolled his eyes as he bounced over to the small group that was standing by the bins outside of the science block. This was their regular spot; they had claimed it back in S3, and nobody had decided to challenge them for it. Well, they had, but the group had Max, and even at 14, he could throw a punch. 

"I don’t know honestly. Just glad I managed to get out of having to do detention. That wouldn’t have been fun.”

George smiled before Lando rolled his eyes.

“It's because its George. He is Mr Wolff’s star student, and he can do no wrong. Besides Georgie boy here wasn’t even in the wrong. It wasn’t his fault anyway. Everyone has been saying that. Honestly, George, dealing with him in your form is still a mystery to me.

Lando said which made George give another smile.

“Yeah, I've been in the same form with him for two years, you get used to it. Anyway, the rest of my form is nice.”

This little group was made up of George Russell, Alex Albon, Lando Norris, Charles Leclerc, Max Verstappen and Pierre Gasly. The original group had been George, Alex and Lando, having all met in nursey and deciding as many 3 to 4 years do, to be friends. All these years later, they were still amazingly close mates. They’d met Charles and Max as both boys had joined at the start of S2, a year to get use to the Scottish school system before Nat 5s. Pierre joined in S3 and just clicked in with the group. Charles and himself were now dating.

All the boys liked Pierre because he’d been a legend in their Nat 5 French class. It had been a more bearable two years with a native speaker, and thankfully Mr Abiteboul liked him. George and Lando had been gratefully relieved to be in that class alright. Charles also had been a useful resource because although being from Monaco, he could also speak French. Of course, now Pierre was showing off by taking AH French, with Mr Abiteboul of all people. Yeah nobody knew how that one worked out. It was okay though because Pierre already had an unconditional to St Andrew's, again which he had managed to keep quiet about it. It was extremely irritating because they had all sent off their UCAS forms at the same time, and George hadn’t heard back off any of the unis yet.

“Anyway, lads, I have exciting news.”

Alex said which caused all the boys to look at him, which caused him to grin even wider.

Bristol’s accepted me. They sent me the email last night. It was there when I checked it this morning.”

This caused all of them to pull Alex into celebration hugs.

“It's for geography. It's conditional right?”

Max asked causing Alex to nod,

“Yeah asking for an A in AH geography but I meet all other requirements, so that’s a positive.”

Alex gave another grin before laughing and turning to look at the others.

“Didn’t you say that Lily’s also applied for Bristol?”

Charles asked, which caused Alex to nod again.

“Yeah, she hasn’t heard anything though.”

Lily Muni and Alex Albon were one of the many couples of the sixth form. They met back in primary school, (Lando and George could confirm this) and decided that they liked each other. Alex had asked her out properly at the end of S4, and they had been a couple since then. It was weird; it seemed that after the stress of Nat 5s, everyone was asking everyone else out. Well, that was the case for three of the couples in their group. George and Nicky were different because Nicky had asked George out after the stress of mocks. George won’t admit it, but he had been a bit of a crying mess when Nicky had left for Uni over the summer. Himself and Max would also deny that they had been a mess and had been playing heartbreak songs for the entire first week back. The joys of Nicky and Daniel both being a year older. (The other four all had video proof of this shared meltdown, but they won’t say anything. They were above that, was good blackmail material though.)

“Any updates for you guys?”

Alex asked looking at all of them; all the boys shook their heads,

“Nah, Sacha has an unconditional from Glasgow. I was over at his when he got the email, and he was so excited.”

Lando gave a small smile, Sacha Fenestraz was a decent guy, and the rest of the group liked him. Everyone was always amazed when they found out that Lando and Sacha had been together since the end of S4.

“What’s Sacha applied for again?”

George asked before Lando gave another grin.

“International relations. He’s met all the grades, but Glasgow did tell him it would be beneficial if he could do a language. So hence why he’s doing AH French, not sure why. He says he enjoys it and that he did well in Highers. Also because AH French is a real laugh and there is a ton of drama between Horner and Abiteboul. You’re in that class right Pierre?”

“Oh definitely, I'm amazed that they thought it was a good idea to put all of us in the class. There's me, Sacha, Lance even if he speaks Canadian French and Esteban is there as well. “

Pierre shrugged. It was amazing how much drama there was between Abiteboul and Horner. Honer was a maths teacher who was bearable. He also happened to be Alex, Max and Pierre’s form teacher. This added to the drama because Pierre got the info from both sides. Of course, he shared all this information. Honestly, it was well known, like even S1 knew about it. It seemed like a sort of induction thing along with all the essential things. It was made slightly worse by the fact that both were form teachers. Form teacher meetings were a nightmare, George had learnt this from Mr Wolff who complained about it.

“Yeah, Esteban is in Abiteboul’s form. Gets a total earful, because he’s fluent. I feel like there is going to be a big scale fight at some point.”

Pierre shrugged before Charles swung his arm around his boyfriend's shoulders.

“At least you don’t have Binotto as a form teacher. I think myself and Antiono have reached almost point of impending death.”

“Also, if we are totally honest, George and Lando have good form teachers. Like George has Wolff and Lando has got both Brown and Seldi.”

Alex said before Lando pipped in

“Just for the record I only have Brown for Tuesdays and Thursdays. Its Seldi for the rest of the week. He’s fun, though. Well if I’m honest Brown is so American, I mean you can defiantly hear him when he’s walking down the corridor talking to people. He does have a really cool collection of cars. He’s shown us all the photos.”

“How does he even have the money for that? Cause I know teachers don’t get paid that much.”

Alex asked again before Lando shot him a look.

“Oh, he and a mate set up this business when they were in Uni, and it's successful, so I don’t know why he decided to carry on studying to become a teacher. I’m glad he did though, and Seldi’s brilliant as well. So happy, I got the decent form teachers, and this is the second year I’ve had them.”

Lando grinned again, clearly pleased with the form allocation from back in S5.

“Oh, another thing I was going to mention speaking of teachers. It's so clear that Hamilton and Vettel like each other.”

Max said again before all the boys looked at him.

“Everyone knows that, do you have proof of this?”

Lando asked, looking at Max, challenging him to show proof of it.

“Yeah, I do actually. Hold on”

Max pulled out his phone from his trouser pocket. They shouldn’t have their phones on them, but they were in sixth form, the teachers were more lenient. Not for the S4s though, Charles’ brother Arthur claimed it was a nightmare with phones and everything. 

“So, I was going to the careers base, because I needed to ask about the whole UCAS issue, which has been sorted if any of you are interested in it. Anway so Vettel was standing there talking to him, and the pair of them looked like they might kiss. I’m convinced that they would have if I hadn’t been there.”

Max proudly showed them the phone and the photo. It was evident that the pair were about to kiss. Ah yes, the issue of Mr Hamiliton and Mr Vettel. Both relatively newly qualified teachers were on the same teaching degree at Uni, did different placement years, and both ended up here. Hamilton was an English teacher, and Vettel was a modern studies teacher. Hamilton also happened to be head of careers as well. Meant he got a lot of S6s having meltdowns over basically anything concerning their futures. It was stressful, and yet somehow Hamilton managed to get through it all. Plus his dog Roscoe was a bonus (He may have managed to smuggle Roscoe in once or twice. The bulldog liked all the attention though, from some stressed 17 and 18-year-olds.) Hamilton was cool with everything that was thrown at him, and everybody liked and respected him for it.

“I love the fact that we are more concerned with the teachers' lives, then our actual studies.”

Pierre laughed before the others again shot him a look.

“You can say that you have an unconditional to St Andrews for law. Plus, it's your first choice.”

Charles said, wrapping his arm around his boyfriend's shoulder. 

“That is very true, my love. Not to brag in the slightest.”

“The only negative is you're still international because your mum and dad are still in France. You haven't lived here long enough to qualify for citizenship. Hence fees, a big reason why St Andrews accepted you. I mean along with your actual exam results.”

Alex said before the others looked at him again. This very true, Pierre was an international student because his home address was still in France, he lived with his aunt and uncle, but his home address on his UCAS and official school documentation was back in France. Thus, meaning he still was going to have to pay fees for Uni, which was expensive. Alex would have to pay as well if he was going to go to Bristol. George had 3 of his unis choices in Scotland and two down in England. He also had his fingers crossed that he could stay in Scotland because it meant that he wouldn’t need to pay (even he had been born in England, he’d lived in Scotland for long enough)

“Suppose so, even still. Anyway, Horner was pleased enough when I told him a few mornings ago.”

Pierre shrugged again.

“Of course, he was, anything to distract him from the ongoing beef. You know it's been brought up in multiple lessons, across all years. I mean last week, in mine and Max’s AH maths class somebody said something, and Horner went off on a rage. I mean it lasted for a solid 10 minutes, was quite enjoyable to watch.”

George shrugged. This was very accurate, at least there was only a few within the AH maths class, it was worse in Nat 5 maths. There had also been the rumour that Horner had said he was very relieved that he didn’t have Arthur Leclerc. He’d barely survived Nat 5 with having Charles in his class. The two Leclerc boys were a bit of a nightmare. Arthur was a decent kid, though, from the few times that George had talked to him. Either when he had been over at Charles or just running into him in corridors and the like.

“Oh hey, Sacha, well done on your unconditional.”

Alex gave a smile as the six spotted Sacha walking over, he gave a grin as he wrapped his arm around Lando’s shoulder and pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“Thanks, guys, yeah it was all a bit of a surprise, wasn’t expecting to hear from Glasgow. It’s a competitive course, but I'm so happy I've managed to get the place. I also heard about your unconditional to St Andrews Pierre. Well done, especially for law.”

“Thanks, man.”

Pierre gave a smile. I mean this was a big deal it, it was so hard to get into places like that, and he’d worked hard for it.

“Anyway, are you coming? I believe we have AH French, and the drama is going to carry on, and stuff is going to go mad.”

Sacha asked causing Pierre to nod,

“What about the rest of you lads? What have you got?”

“Max and I have got AH maths so again stuff is going to go down.”

George laughed, causing Max to nod, having been on his phone the whole time. No doubt texting Daniel. Daniel was at Liverpool doing Criminology. He’d found that he’s quite liked it at Nat 5, and he’d gotten an A in it and decided that he wanted to carry on with it. Had no idea what he wanted to do with after Uni, but he could worry about that later. 

“I’ve got modern studies with Vettel.”

Lando said with a smile. Again, nobody saw Lando doing modern studies, but after taking it at Higher as another subject, he really enjoyed it, and Vettel was a good teacher.

“Alex and I have got free periods. I’ve got a ton of work to do. I hate dissertations so much.”

Charles groaned which caused the others to laugh.

“You were the one who chose to take AH English, not us.”

Max shrugged causing all the boys to death stare him.

“Says the guy who doesn’t take any subjects that require him to do dissertations.”

This was true; Max was doing AH maths, AH chemistry and higher psychology.

“Well, that was my own decision. I still have to write reports and stuff. Not an easy pass.”

Max shrugged again causing all of the guys to sigh.

The guys all said their farewells before heading off, their separate ways.

* * *

“Morning, sir.”

George groaned as he made his way into AH maths, he didn’t mind maths. He needed it for his uni course. It wasn’t that bad, Horner was alright, but the drama between him and Abiteboul certainly made life more enjoyable.

“Morning, George, Max.”

Horner sighed as he noticed them; he was tired. It was likely down to the fact he had Nat 5 maths before break. Or that department meeting hadn’t gone that well. Thinking about it, he taught higher maths before break on a Monday. George knew that because Callum had maths at that point, so it was a department meeting.

“Right so we are going to carry on with the questions from last lessons.”

Horner said before he turned to the board and began writing.

“What are your guesses to how long it’ll take before he figures out, the pen is running out.”

Max whispered at George who whispered back,

“10 minutes, that was how long it was last time.”

However, before this could happen, they all heard a familiar sound.

“Right fire alarm, onto the playing fields. Single file, no talking.”

“Alright lads? This is exciting, isn’t it?”

Max and George were greeted by Sacha and Pierre, as they made their way past the language corridor.

“What did I say about no talking? Mr Fenestraz, you and Mr Gasly can carry on with your conversation with Mr Russell and Mr Verstappen once you get outside.”

A teacher said, they couldn’t see who it was.

“So, what do you reckon caused the fire alarm then?”

George could hear whispered muttering as he made his way to his form and lined up. He could then see Wolff come over to them to register them.

“So it looks likes it was a false alarm. Whichever one of you thought it was funny, it's not, and I will be finding out who did it, and there will be repercussions.”

The deputy head said before sighing and making the signal allowing the school to disperse and make their way back to their classes.

“I’m freezing.”

Lando rubbed his arms as the group met up as they walked back to the main school buildings along with Sacha and Lily.

“That’s because you're only in your shirt, why did you even take off your jumper? Its January.”

Sacha gave another sigh before taking off his jumper and helping Lando pull it over his head,

“Love you.”

Lando smiled as he pulled his head through the jumper neck.

“I’d taken off my jumper because it was really warm in the classroom and I couldn’t grab it.”

“Are we surprised, though that Lando is the one that found a classroom baking in the middle of Scottish January. Freezing.”

Pierre gave another laugh as Charles voiced his agreements.

“You two are from France and Monaco; you’re used to warmer weather. How long have you both lived here? You should use this by now.”

George gave another laugh, which caused the others to laugh, as they made their way back inside.


	3. Supermarket fights and Sixth form raves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> January- Marcus and Callum are trying to be nice friends yet that doesn't work out. Also there is a fight in that Waitrose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Number three-  
> So this was just fun to write. Based on my and friends experience going to ADSA at 10pm, wouldn't recommend it. Especially when you're tired. Also, Waitrose is stereotypically where all the posh people shop. So it was perfect for a quick fight.  
> Hope you all enjoy,  
> This a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Scottie Dog  
> xx

“Why are we doing this in Tesco again?”

Marcus asked as he walked beside Callum, who was pushing the trolley along.

“Because you threw up in ASDA whilst you had food poisoning and therefore meaning we can never show our faces ever again there.”

Marcus shrugged,

“Well, I mean not officially banned or anything.”

Callum turned to look at him again,

“I don’t care if there isn’t an official ban. We aren’t facing the label of oh there’s that couple where the one with the Kiwi accent even if he’s lived up here since he was three, threw up in the dairy aisle because the smell of milk made him feel even worse.”

Callum shrugged as he carried on walking down the aisle with Marcus following.

“I get that, but why are we the ones that got allocated TESCO?”

“Because we live the closest and it's not a massive trek. Mick and Robert are only in M&S because it’s a five-minute walk from Rob’s.”

“Ok, but where are the other three?”

“Yeah, Christian, Jüri and Juan are at Waitrose.”

“Who decided letting them into Waitrose was a good idea?”

“I don’t know. All George said to me was ‘Hey Callum, the S6s have realised that it's cheaper if we bring our own supplies for the S6 do. I still have no idea what it is. Would you mind getting these things, and I’ll allocate you the money from the committee budget’ True to his word he has sent me the money.”

Marcus tilted his head again before looking confused.

“Wait, so if he’s supposed to be doing it, why are we?”

“Nicky’s back from Uni for the weekend, and George wanted to spend time with him.”

That was enough information for Marcus who gave the nod, yet again he was grateful he was dating a guy who was in the same year as him. He was broken out of his thoughts by Callum gently shoving him.

“Look who it is, we aren’t going to cause a scene about it.”

“Why would we be causing a scene in Tesco at 1 pm on a Saturday?”

Marcus asked before pausing when what Callum meant. Mr Vettel and Mr Hamilton were standing in the free-from aisle (which was also the vegan one as well) holding hands and laughing about something. Hamilton pressed a kiss to Vettel’s head leaving Callum and Marcus frozen on the spot.

“See I told you, they were a thing.”

Marcus whispered before Callum nodded.

* * *

The Chaotic mess:

Callum- So we have discovered something big

Mick- In what sense?

Marcus- Hamilton and Vettel are standing in the free-from aisle, holding hands, laughing and kissing.

Christian- Oh thank god, I thought it was something terrible.

Jüri- Yeah, glad to see you haven’t been ‘banned’ from another supermarket Marcus.

Marcus- I am never going to live that down, am I?

Robert- Yeah, you aren’t, but this is exciting information. Makes this day way more interesting.

Callum- I guess, then you’re in M&S. Nothing interesting ever happens in M&S.

Mick- Yeah, it isn't exciting. I’m currently standing by the self-service watching Rob scan everything. It's strangely satisfying.

Christian- So you're a helpful boyfriend then?

Mick- Where are you anyway?

Jüri- Waitrose. Christian and I are helping Juan out with getting some stuff for his family to get together.

Christian- We didn’t have anything better to do. Juan asked us, and we’re lovely friends. Anyway, we’d better go.

* * *

Callum sighed as he turned off his phone.

“Our friends aren’t helpful, are they?”

He gave a laugh making Marcus nod.

“Yeah, oh well. Let's carry on; we need to get the stuff for George. We’re nice people, and I have this video I wanted to show you.”

Marcus gave another grin before squeezing Callum’s hand and holding onto it. The pair of them held hands a lot; they even had matching bracelets. They’d bought them for each other, for their first anniversary “Ok let's go, can you recheck the list? I want to make sure we have everything.”

Callum asked before starting to push the trolley again. However, the pair of them stopped as they saw Hamilton and Vettel walking towards them. The couple in their little world, not aware of the two slightly confused looking 16 years and 17-year-olds who were standing there.

“Oh hello, Mr Hamilton and Mr Vettel. Nice to see both of you.”

Callum gave another smile when they got spotted.

“Hello to the pair of you as well.”

Vettel gave a smile to them. It was weird seeing the two teachers out of school and meeting them in a supermarket on a Saturday. Callum was somewhat relieved that Marcus hadn’t been sick again. He still had flashbacks about it.

ASDA- Four months earlier

_“Shut up; I swear I’m fine. Besides I’m totally up for a 10 pm ADSA run.”_

_Marcus laughed as he was on Callum’s back, his arms wrapped around his boyfriend's neck._

_“They all probably think we’re drunk right now.”_

_Christian laughed as he clung as he had his arms wrapped around both Juan and Jüri._

_“Let them think that, we are aware of what we’re doing. Also, why are we doing this again?”_

_Mick asked as he was curled into Robert. They had all been staying over at Callum’s and were bored. It was then at that point they had figured out that the nearby ASDA was 24/7 and Mick could drive. So, of course, that’s why they were here. They weren’t sure what they were here for. It was just fun._

_“So, when we get asked, what did you do over the weekend, we can say we were causing havoc at a 24/7 ADSA. Look at us, so wild.”_

_Juan laughed again, as the six of them made their way down towards the dairy aisle, ignoring the looks from the staff. They had likely seen worse than a bunch of six 16- and 17-years old boys, running down the aisles._

_“Wait, I don’t feel that good. Callum, can you let me down?”_

_Marcus said, when the five of them reached the dairy aisle, looking pale._

_“Hey, you alright? You look under the weather?”_

_Christian asked as he gently started rubbing Marcus’ back who was bent over, whilst the others formed a circle around him, shielding him from any other onlookers. They weren’t going to let their mate suffer any embarrassment; they were a tight-knit group after all._

_“Wait, oh god. I think I’m going to throw up.”_

_Marcus said before he was sick and started coughing._

_“Hey, it's ok. Let it all out; it's fine. Isn't it lads?”_

_Christian said as he carried on rubbing Marcus’ back whilst the others nodded._

_“Ok. I think that’s everything. I feel a bit better actually.”_

_Marcus said as he stood up before Callum wrapped his arm around his boyfriend and pressed a kiss to his forehead._

_“Can we go? I still don’t feel great.”_

_Marcus asked, causing the others to nod._

Since then, none of them had been back to that ADSA. They had told someone that somebody had been sick and then ran. They never mentioned Marcus by name, but they could all see that it was clicking in the person’s head, that the slightly looking ill one was the one that been sick.

Vettel was always nice to any of the students that he ran into, which somehow made everything not as awkward. Both the boys knew that teachers outside of school had lives. It was just weird seeing them not in a school environment.

“How are you two anyway? It certainly is a pleasant surprise to see both of you.”

Hamilton asked, he also was nice towards any students he ran into.

“We’re both good, how about you?”

Marcus asked, for once he was sensible, which meant he was less likely to say something dumb. It could still happen, and that meant Callum needed to stay on edge.

“Very well actually, thanks, Marcus. Now if you excuse boys, we need to get going.”

Vettel said again before both boys nodded and said their goodbyes. Thankfully the rest of the shop was fine, so was the walk back to Callum’s. Unfortunately, this sense of normality was gone, the minute they could hear their phones beeping.

* * *

The chaotic mess:

Christian- Guys, you need to check Jüri’s Instagram live.

Marcus- Why?

Christian- Oh Horner and Abitebuoul happen to be having a rather heated argument.

Callum- And this is happening in Waitrose?

Christian- Correct.

With that, Callum automatically opened Jüri’s Instagram live where he and Marcus were greeted by the sight of the two teachers shouting at each other. It was hard to make out what they were saying, but it was funny, making it even more apparent that they didn’t like each other. This went on for a few more minutes before Jüri’s live stopped

The chaotic mess

Jüri- Had to stop the live, almost got rumbled, plus Juan’s shoulders were getting tired.

Robert- Wait, so you were filming over an alsie? Didn’t anyone see you?

Jüri- I think everyone was more focused on the two middle-aged men being passive-aggressive to each other, rather than the 16-year-old filming the whole thing.

Mick- How many people follow you on Instagram?

Jüri- Quite a few. Oh, I see what you mean.

Christian- Yeah, this is going to be doing the rounds without a shadow of a doubt.

* * *

Of course, this was exactly was what happened, and Mrs Williams called in both teachers. The head of the sixth form, nobody was sure quite why she’d agreed to do it. They were both S6 form teachers, and the higher-ups likely didn’t want to deal with the whole thing of the two teachers making a scene in a supermarket. Callum had heard Mrs Williams yelling at them as he walked past her office.

“I don’t care who started this. Christian, Cyril you are adults and yet your acting like S1s. I don’t care if this carries on, but I don’t want you airing your grievances in public.”

Then

“Yes Claire”

Mick laughed as Callum slid in next to him in their business class and told him everything he’d heard. This was very true; it sounded like a total nightmare having to deal with both teachers. The S6s had figured out to deal with it all. Besides, there was the whole problem between Pierre and Esteban that seemed to take up most of the issues within that AH French class; nobody had any clue what that was about. Even their boyfriends, Charles and Lance, hadn't worked it out either.

“Right, I don’t want to hear any whispers surrounding Mr Horner or Mr Abiteboul. Or the fact that Mr Lotterer and Mr Vergne have gotten engaged. Understand?”

Mr Wolff said as he made his way into the classroom before Jamie raised her hand.

“Is it because you’re upset Mr Wolff as you and Mrs Wolff are no longer the total power couple of this school?”

This caused, of course, Callum and Mick to give Jamie a thumbs up which made her smile. Jamie was one of the few girls in this class, and she’d proven that she could keep up with the boys, and they all liked her.

“I will not give you a straight answer, Miss Chadwick, but I will say that you are not far off from the truth. Now what I will tell you all is that adults act like children sometimes. It also makes form teacher meetings very interesting, though. Now let's move on to this actual lesson. Now did you do the homework?”

The rest of the lesson went fine, as it always did. Nothing crazy ever happened in business; it was one of the few subjects where there was a sense of calm. No that was a lie, Wolff sometimes swore in German, and there was also a small rivalry between the business and economics teachers. It never reared its head, but everyone knew about it.

“So I think the Horner, Abieboul thing is getting embedded in this school.”

Christian commented whilst they were sitting at lunch.

“What makes you say that?”

Juan asked none of the guys was really sure when Juan Manuel Correa had joined their group, it felt as though he’d always been there, but it was probably S1 or S2. The rest of the group had been friends since primary school; it turned out that Mick and Rob had even been at the same nursery. Callum and Marcus joined in Primary 1, Jüri was Primary 3, and Christian was Primary 5. There was also a ton of embarrassing photos of them all in primary school as well. Mick knew for a fact, his mum’s laptop screen saver was a photo of him on his first day of school holding his older sister Gina’s hand, whilst she was in her own uniform going into Primary 3. It was cute, if somewhat embarrassing.

“The student teachers have not stopped talking about it.”

Christian answered before he sighed again, noticing the confused looks on the others’ faces. “Two of the student teachers Vandoorne and Frijns, speak Dutch. I don’t speak Dutch; however, Nick does speak Dutch, and we both happen to be in the same higher chemistry class. When we were walking to chemistry, we passed said student teachers who were speaking in said language. Whilst we were waiting to be let into the lab, Nick translated, and it seems even the student teachers are invested in this whole mess, cause that’s what this is right now. A big mess.”

This made Jüri laugh,

“Well, we need to keep it within these walls, can’t let any school inspectors or the like, find out about it. Would drop the school’s rankings in the private school league table. I learnt about that in Nat 5 sociology.”

“I still am amazed that you managed to pull through that subject and then decided to take modern studies which is very similar as your fifth higher subject.”

Mick said as he looked as Jüri with a pointed look.

“I needed a fifth subject, and it seemed like a good one, which you will be pleased to know it is. Also I have Vettel, who is a fantastic teacher. Also, Mick and Callum, you know this, you have him as a form teacher. Anyway, there are better relationships within this school to focus on.”

Jüri gave another grin before Juan playful shoved his shoulder.

“Like who? We need examples.”

“Let's see, The Wolffs, Vergne and Lotterer, Hamilton and Vettel unconfirmed yes but still. Then the increasing potential of Alonso and Button. They are a thing. Oh and then also the two student teachers as well.”

“Wait, what student teachers, are we are talking about?”

Callum asked, tilting his head looking at Christian whilst Marcus was also leaning on his shoulders looking at him.

“Oh yeah, them.”

He clicked his fingers before explaining

“Robin Frijins and Antonio Felix de Costa. They are a thing, and everyone knows it.”

“They’re both excellent teachers if any of you are wondering. Also, Frijins was the one who walked in on our spur of the moment rave in the comm. He didn’t say anything at all and got the respect from the whole of the sixth form. Hence why none of us has snitched on him and De Costa when we’re caught them making out. That has happened, more than once.”

Jüri added which made Marcus frantically nod.

“Might I ask, what the whole point of the spur of the moment rave was?”

Mick asked, he, of course, had not been at the rave as he had class.

“Well a few of the teachers were off, so there was a lot of S5s who didn’t have classes. Some S6s had free periods. Basically, everyone gets on, and somebody had their speaker and one thing lead to another. It was fun; also Williams wasn’t in her office, so she wasn’t there to bust us. I still have no idea how Frijins busted us, well not busted us totally.”

Christian said shrugging, with a small laugh

“I will say I’m impressed that nobody has said anything, cause it means that we all know, we could have another one if we’re careful.”

Marcus smiled again before Callum sighed,

“Dude, you know that things like that end in disaster for you. I sometimes am convinced that the only reason why I’m dating you is to make sure you don’t hurt yourself.”

“Oh yeah, it was just a relief that Callum is taller than you Marcus and manage to catch you, that could have ended up nasty.”

Jüri said, before Juan, Robert and Mick looked at the four who had been involved in the spur of the moment rave.

“Mr Armstrong here thought it was a good idea to get up onto one the tables, almost fell off and broke his ankle. Thankfully Callum, his knight in shining armour managed to get hold of him and got him off the table, and no broken bones.”

Christian clarified before the six burst out laughing again,

“Oh, Marcus, what are we doing to do with you.”

Robert smiled before Marcus grinned back at all of them.

“Lads, you have been dealing with me since we were literal children. You know you secretly love it. You also all know that we are going to stay in this group for our whole lives. “

All of them knew this, and deep down, all of them also knew that they didn’t want to have it any other way. Even if Marcus was a handful at times, they also had learned they were avoiding 24/7 ASDAs.


	4. Primary School and Best Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The chaotic mess origin story

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So after I wrote the last shot, I wrote this one.  
> Would also advise not hanging upside down on monkey bars for long periods of time. All the blood going to your head isn't that fun and leaves you feeling a bit sick. (Also I don't speak Estonian, so google translate time)  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you guys enjoy,  
> Scottie Dog  
> xx

P1- Marcus, Callum, Mick and Robert

Nursey had been one thing, but now 5-year-old Marcus was facing the entirely new thing that was school. He wasn’t sure how to feel about it, because at nursery, you could wear your own clothes, and you could play with blocks, the water tray and with scooters and bikes at break. You couldn’t do that at school, and you had to wear a uniform, and he’d to try it on in the shop. He hated trying on clothes in shops, and he had to get new shoes. Plus, he and his mummy kept getting stopped by people in the shops asking about him starting school like the lady who worked in the shop where he got his shoes and had spent ages talking to his mummy.

“First time buying school shoes and everything then?”

“Yeah, it's all still a bit surreal. It’s the whole thing where you know it's happening, but you also can’t believe it.”

“I can understand that. I’ve got three in primary school, and I was like that with every single one of them. I also don’t want to be rude, but I can hear an accent not around from here.”

“Oh no, it's fine. Lots of people notice it, myself and my husband are from New Zealand, but we moved over here about three years ago for work. The little one was born in New Zealand but went to nursery over here and such. He does have a Kiwi accent.”

“Well, they do say, kids, learn from their parents, so I guess where that comes from. Anway that in total is £34.”

“Brilliant, thanks for your help. Come on, Marcus, let's go.”

So here Marcus was, standing in his new classroom, in his new uniform after his mummy and daddy had left. His daddy was even going into work later because it was a big day. Even his grandma and grandad back in Auckland said it was a big day. They had even sent him a Kiwi cuddly toy for good luck. Said Kiwi was on his bed at home because you couldn’t bring your cuddly toys to school.

“Ah, there are you, Marcus. Right, you're going to be sitting at that table over there.”

The teacher said, pointing to a table where three other boys were sitting there. So Marcus made his way over to the table nervously, would they be nice or mean? Marcus hoped they would be nice.

“Hi, I'm Callum, that’s Rob, and that’s Mick. What’s your name?”

One of the boys asked as Marcus sat down, and Callum pointed out the other two. Both also saying hi before Marcus let out a small

“Hi, I’m Marcus”

“You have an accent. Where are you from? I’m from Germany; Rob’s from Russia and Callum’s from here. His mummy’s English, so that’s why he sounds English.”

Mick asked, looking at Marcus as he sat down, all three of the boys although also being between the ages of 5 and 6, were bigger than Marcus, but they all seemed really friendly.

“Um, I was born in New Zealand, but I've lived here since I was three.”

“Oh cool, you have Kiwis in New Zealand and earthquakes.”

Mick grinned which caused the other two boys to look at him.

“How do you know that?”

Robert asked which caused Mick to grin even wider.

“Gina’s class had to do a project on a country, and she got given New Zealand. Kiwis are birds, and they look weird; she showed me a photo on google.”

“Mick’s big sister Gina is in P3.”

Callum said as an explanation causing Marcus to nod. It was obvious to him that these boys weren’t going to be mean. They were going to be nice. That was good, also would they want to be friends with him?

“Right class, so welcome to P1.”

The teacher said making everyone turn their heads to the front. It was fairly straight forward, following everything and maybe school wasn’t that bad.

“Hey, do you want to come and play with us? We are totally going to the climbing frame.”

Robert asked as the class made their way out to the playground, with their coats on, pulled up around them. (It was Scottish September. It was freezing)

“Ok”

Marcus gave a small nod which caused Rob to grin and take Marcus’ hand, pulling him along following Mick and Callum.

“So I take it, your first day wasn’t that bad then?”

Marcus smiled up at his mummy as the pair of them walked out of the school gates. It was amazing how quickly the three hours had gone by.

“Yeah, I made some friends.”

“That’s brilliant. What are their names?”

“Callum, Robert even though he likes to be called Rob and Mick.”

Marcus gave another smile whilst his mummy also gave another one. This was confirmed the following day. Marcus heard his name being called when he walked through the gate and saw the three standing there with grins on their faces. Marcus looked up at his mummy who had noticed this.

“Go on then. I’ll see you later.”

She bent down to press a kiss to Marcus’ head before he ran off, to the other three.

“Look, I think our mummies might become friends like us.”

Callum said, pointing to where all of their mums were standing talking.

“That means we could hang out at each other’s houses if they are all friends. That would be fun.”

Robert said, causing the others to nod. Marcus liked this group, and he was hoping that they would be friends for ages.

* * *

P3- Jüri joins the group

“So I think we’re going to get the new boy at our table.”

Robert said as the four boys made their way into their new P3 classroom. They had been delighted when they’d discovered that they were going to be in the same class. P2 hadn’t been that much fun because all of them were in different classes, and they could only see each other at break and lunch. That wasn’t ever enough time. It didn’t matter that they saw each other at the weekends, they all wanted to be in the same class. They knew they were getting one of the new kids because they had been told that on their taster day into P3. Gina had said P3 was fun; she was in P5 now. It was a bit of shame because it now meant she was allowed into the big playground and they couldn’t go and annoy her and her friends. She hadn’t said anything to the boys, but they all knew she was very happy, especially from the look of joy on her face when she’d figured this out.

“Hello, you four. You promise that if we let you all sit together, you work hard?”

The teacher gave a small smile when she spotted the four boys. All of them seemed to travel in a pack, which was surprising; they were always together. So she was hoping that they would be ok with having another person added to their table. The four boys proceeded to nod before slowly making their way to their table after they said all of their hellos. As they reached their table, they were greeted by a new face. He looked slightly nervous and was eyeing the boys with a level of caution. Like he wasn’t sure if they were going to be nice to him. So the boys decided that they were going to be nice to him.

“Hi, you must be new. I’m Marcus, that’s Rob, Callum and Mick.”

Marcus said which caused the boy to give a small smile, relaxing before he gave another small smile,

“I’m Jüri.”

“That’s a cool name.”

Robert smiled, which made Jüri smile again, before Marcus noticed his name written out, along with the rest of the boys’ names that were on the page on their table. It was done so that the teacher was able to tell who was on each table, so they didn’t get people mixed up.

“Oh, your name has one of those dots, you know the ones on top of letters.”

“I’m from Estonia, so I have a little bit of a weird name. Well, it's weird over here. We’re over here because of my ema jas isa’s work.”

Jüri gave a small smile sounding a bit sad. That wasn’t fair, so Mick shook his head.

“No, your name’s cool. Like its really unique and people aren’t going to you mixed up with other people.”

“What does ema jas isa mean?”

Marcus asked looking confused before Jüri grinned,

“Oh, it means mum and dad in Estonian. I’m still finding English hard.”

Callum laughed again before looking at Jüri straight in the eyes.

“Yeah, your name is really cool. I mean you must be the only one in this school with that name. There are so many Callums. I’m the only one in P3 though. Don’t worry about speaking English. Mick and Rob aren’t native English speakers, even if they have been here for ages. Rob speaks Russian, and Mick speaks German. Sometimes they say stuff in those languages.”

Callum said in explanation, Jüri having clearly perked up a bit which made the other boys happy. They didn’t like it when people were sad, that wasn’t fun. Plus Jüri could also be another person in their group. They were quite a tight-knit group of four, but they could always have another person.

“Would you like to play with us at break? Marcus is convinced that he can hang upside down on the monkey bars; we need to make sure that he doesn’t hurt himself. He can’t fully hang upside down on the monkey bars.”

Jüri nodded as Rob asked him as the pair of them pulled on their coats. This made Rob smile before motioning for Jüri to follow him, which he did. The pair were greeted by Callum and Mick watching Marcus. He had climbed the monkey bars, attempting to swing his body round to hang upside down.

“He discovered that he could do this when we were at the park last week.”

Mick sighed when they spotted the two coming over to them.

“Can I hang out with you guys?”

Jüri asked before getting nods from all of them,

“Yeah, oh I think all the blood is going to my head.”

Marcus started to swing back and forward, the others looking at him with the most worried looks that a bunch of 8 years old could manage. Eventually, Marcus turned back up; he was surprisingly strong for an eight-year-old.

“See I’m fine, promise.”

He said as he climbed down from the monkey bars, grinning at the others.

“You still look dizzy.”

Jüri said as the four watched Marcus sway a bit.

“See Jüri is a good addition to this group.”

Mick gave another smile.

* * *

P5-Christian joins the group,

P5 had a lot of different things that the boys were looking forward to. They got to go into the big playground, they had a camp, (well it was only three days, two nights) and there were also a ton of school trips. Well, they were going off Gina’s comments. She was now at the top of the school in P7, but she was happy to help out the little group, which they were all grateful for. It was nice having somebody older looking out for them. She’s only figured out, too late that they could now annoy her without that much of a problem.

They also happened to be in the same class as well, again. This had been met by great delight when the five found this out; this had worried all of the teachers. They were a smart bunch, but they could be a little bit of a nightmare when they were all together. The five were walking down the corridor and towards their new classroom, they were in a different building now. It was a bit harder now to find their way around, but they were managing. They also were now with the big kids, P5, P6 and P7. They also spotted that some new kids were standing around the coat pegs looking confused. So, of course, Marcus decided to go and say hello to one of them.

“Hi, I’m Marcus, what’s your name? Your new right?”

This caused the boy to look confused before slowly offering a nod, looking slightly scared. Marcus did have that effect on people. Jüri could confirm that he had been somewhat frightened by Marcus’ level of enthusiasm when they had met for the first time. So, of course, they four had made their way over to made sure that Marcus wasn’t causing that much trouble,

“Yeah, I’m Chrisitan. It's nice to meet you.”

“Hi, it is nice to meet you too. Those are my friends Rob, Mick, Callum and Jüri. Jüri’s from Estonia, that’s why he’s got the two dots at the top of the u in his name. So just to let you know, if you spot it.”

“Ok, it's nice to meet you guys as well.”

Chrisitan gave a small wave when he saw the other four standing there, the others also waving back. The boys didn’t think anything about it that much until they noticed that the tables had six chairs on them.

“Do you want to come and sit with us?”

Mick asked when they saw Christian standing looking around, confused. He nodded before making his way over to the five who grinned, and he slowly pulled out his chair and sat down, looking at them all.

“Thanks for letting me sit with you guys. All my friends are back in Demark, so I don’t really have that many over here.”

“Oh, cool. That isn’t good for Callum though because now he’s the only actual British one. Like he has a British passport, but the rest of us don’t. I’m originally from New Zeland, Mick’s from Germany, Rob’s from Russia and like I said before Jüri’s from Estonia.”

Marcus laughed, which seemed to perk Christian up a bit.

“That’s good to know. How long have you guys been friends for?”

He asked before Callum butted in again, stopping from Marcus talking again,

“So myself, Marcus, Rob and Mick have been friends since we were in P1, then Jüri joined in P3. You can hang out with us if you want. We don’t want you to be lonely.”

Christian gave another smile and a laugh before giving a nod,

“I’d like that, you all seem fun if that’s ok with you guys. I don’t want to be an inconvenience.”

He said again before slowly looking down again, which made the others shake their heads.

“No, we’d like if you hung out with us. If anything we need another person, to make sure that Marcus doesn’t hurt himself again.”

“What do you mean?”

Christian looked interested before Mick explained,

“Marcus likes to think that he is the expert in hanging upside down on the monkey bars. He’s discovered that there are monkey bars in the big playground. We all know that he’s going to try. So we need another person, that’s only if you want to?”

“No. I’d be happy to, don’t want Marcus to hurt himself. Even if I’ve only known you guys for about 3 hours.”

This made the other five nine-year-olds give wide grins.

“Perfect. I can also show you my amazing monkey bars skills.”

Marcus smiled, clearly happy that he’d discovered another person to show his skills to.

It seemed that Marcus’ skills on the monkey bars were enough to draw Christian into their weird little group, and he had decided to stay in the group. It was the six of them for the rest of primary school, and the first year of secondary school. It was only in S2 that the final member of their group joined.

* * *

S2- Juan joins the group,

Morning my lovely friends. There’s a new guy in my class, and I was wondering if he could hang out with us at break?”

Jüri asked one morning at break, a few days into the new term. The other boys looked at him before they voiced their agreements. It was the following morning when the rest of the boys met Juan for the first time.

“So that must be Juan. Hold on, over here, boys.”

Callum waved his hand, catching their attention and Jüri signalled for Juan to follow him.

“Hi, your Juan, right? It's nice to meet you.”

Juan gave a small smile,

“Hi, Jüri’s told me about you guys. You all seem cool.”

This made the others guys grin again before Rob spoke. It was a weird thing, the group didn’t exactly have a leader, but they all took turns in being the leader. It seemed that today was Rob’s turn to be the leader of their group.

“Jüri’s told us about you as well. It also seems that you're over here for the exact same reason, the rest of us are.”

This made Juan to look at the group confused, before Mick smiled, trying to make the whole situation less confusing. They forgot that other people didn’t get what they were talking about half the time.

“Your mum and dad are over here for work, and they discovered this school, looked at the reviews, and decided that it was a good place to send their kids.”

This made Juan laugh,

“Yeah, I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I was told we were moving over to Scotland. But maybe it won’t be that bad. Not if you guys are happy to hang out with me?”

“Yeah, we’re happy with that. Also, Marcus has his monkey bars skills to show you.”

Juan again looked confused, before Christian sighed again,

“Marcus has never gotten out of his ‘I can hang upside down on the monkey bars’ phase. Its also a ritual in this group, to make sure that he doesn’t fall off and crack his head. I think you’ll fit right in here.”


	5. Lovesick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arthur's clearly in love with Gianluca but he isn't sure if he feels the same. His friends are worried, so is his brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi.  
> This was inspired by the recent Prema video where Arthur and Gianluca were singing you're Beautiful by James Blunt. Also, google translate time.   
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you enjoy   
> Scottie Dog xx

Aallez-vous en- Go away

Tu ne t’aides pas- You aren’t helping yourself.

“Oh, hey, Pierre. Thanks for coming round. I have a slight problem.”

Pierre was greeted by a slightly tired looking Charles when he opened the door.

“Hey, what's up? What have you done?”

“Oh, I hadn’t done anything. It's probably easier to show you.”

Charles took Pierre’s hand and led him inside upstairs and ending up in front of Arthur’s bedroom door.

“Why is there the sound of ‘you’re beautiful’ playing? I feel like I should be worried.”

“Yeah, it happens to be the song that was in the background at the S3 disco when my lovely brother figured out that he liked Gianluca. He didn’t really think about it, because he was more focused on getting the groundwork done for the first year of Nat 5s. Now it's come back; I'm convinced its due to Oscar and Logan becoming a couple.”

“How long has he been like this for then? This is like Max and George playing Adele for the entire first week back after Dan and Nicky left for Uni. I didn’t even realise that they even liked Adele.”

“Oh, it's down to that Adele concert, where it all got a bit emotional.”

“Yeah, the one in August in Glasgow. I remember now, that was after we got our exam result, confirming Dan and Nicky’s Uni places, resulting in Max and George being wrecks. It was a good concert, though. We were all emotional wrecks at the end of it if I’m being truthful though. Why did we even subject ourselves to that again?”

“It was because Daniel’s sister had bought the concert tickets for her and her mates. Something came up and like three of them couldn’t make it. So all of them decided not to go, and she asked Daniel if he wanted to go. He agreed because its Adele. So it was him, Max, Lando and Sacha. Michelle still had the tickets from her mates left, and it seemed like a sensible idea to give Daniel the tickets as well. Cause all of them were in the same row. So he and Max asked the rest of us. I enjoyed it, though.”

“I did, as well.”

“Yeah glad we did it. “Oh yeah, there’s the Adele now. Arthur, you know this isn't helping the situation at all.”

Pierre looked at Charles, who sighed, before knocking on the door getting a muffled “Allez-Vous en.”

“Tu ne t'aides pas.”

“Arthur, you know you're making this way worse than it needs to be.”

“I’m fine; leave me alone.”

Arthur switching to English, sounded like he had been crying.

“Hey, let me try.”

Pierre sighed before knocking on Arthur’s door,

“Arthur, you clearly aren’t fine. You’ve been bottling it up, and the Spotify playlist is a clear indication of that.”

“How do you know that?”

“So far from what I've gathered, there’s been a ton of Adele and in particular ‘set fire to the rain’, which Charles tells me is one of your and Gianluca’s songs. Along with a ton of other songs. I mean ‘you're beautiful’ by Jame Blunt? That is a sad song. Also, I'm convinced the playlist has heartbroken in the title. Look me, and Charles just want to make sure you're alright. I know it’s the same with your mama. I’m also sure that the rest of your friends are worried about you.”

At this point, the pair could hear the door open and were greeted by the sight of a slightly teary Arthur. He looked like he had been crying and didn’t look like his usual self, so Pierre pulled him into a tight hug, wrapping his arms around him before tilting his head to Charles who came over and also wrapped his arms around the two.

“Hey, let's go downstairs, yeah. Get you out of that room, and you can come and talk to myself and Charles. You’ll feel better. I promise”

This seemed to calm down Arthur who still refused to let go of either Charles or Pierre as the three made their way down into the kitchen before the three detached before Arthur moved so he was sticking to Charles, wanting the comfort from his older brother.

“So what's the issue with Gianluca then?”

Pierre asked as the three of sat at the kitchen table,

“I don’t know. Like we’ve been friends since we were little and it's weird, I’ve never had the urge to kiss him but the when I saw him at the S3 disco, I just viewed him differently. He was with his girlfriend at the time, but they've broken up. Like I know I’m only 16, but I love him”

Arthur gave a small sigh; he clearly had feelings for Gianluca; at least he was straight forward about it.

“The problem is, I don’t know if he feels the same way about me.”

Arthur sighed again before Charles squeezed his hand.

“Talk to him, that’s the best way to be. Don’t let all of this bottle up, okay? Also, the pair of us are always around.”

* * *

“Hey, you alright? You seem better than you did on Friday.”

Logan smiled at Arthur as he sat down next to him in Nat 5 French on Monday.

“Yeah, just was having an off day I suppose.”

He smiled back before they heard the door open, and Mr Vergne walked in. Mr Jean-Eric Vergne or JEV as all the teachers seemed to call him was fun, and it was also clear that his class was way calmer than Abitebuoul’s. Not always, but most of the time. Also, Vergne and Mr Lotterer, one of the German teachers and year head of S4 were a downright power couple. It honestly was an amazing thing to witness them walking hand in hand down the language corridor aware of their power couple status. The other power couple to the same extent was the Wolffs. Toto was a business teacher and an S6 form teacher, whilst Susie was another Maths teacher and head of S3. Again, Arthur was very grateful she was his maths teacher.

“Morning class, I have some very exciting news, and I feel the need to share it with you. I also intend to do with the rest of my classes.”

Arthur mouthed the word wedding at Logan who nodded clearly thinking the same thing. Then again, that was likely what the whole class was thinking.

“Right, so Mr Lotterer and I have gotten engaged.”

Vergne gave a huge smile whilst the rest of the class started their congratulations.

“Going to invite us to your wedding then Sir?”

Arthur gave a grin before Vergne sighed,

“Do I expect anything less from you, Leclerc? You are just like your brother. You certainly are one of my favourite Nat 5 class from the past few years. I’ll give you all that. So I guess I’ll think about it.”

Vergne laughed. Arthur had certainly heard that he was like his brother on multiple occasions. He didn’t really mind it; there were quite a few others who had heard they were similar or not similar to their siblings. Enzo certainly had been mistaken for Pietro once or twice.

“Can we tell the S5s and S6s who had you for Nat 5, that you like us better?”

Someone asked which caused Vergne to sigh again before pinching the skin between his nose.

“Forget I said that right, let's move onto today lesson. I hope that you all have prepared for your mini speaking tests in your pairs. You all knew it was coming, so there are no excuses. Also, I am not taking any comments surrounding a few members of this class who are fluent French speakers, and the people who are partnered with them for the speaking. You all chose who you wanted to be partners with. Besides, we all know a lot of you find it beneficial. Anyway, because I’m a fantastic teacher, I’ll give you 10 minutes prep time. We also are doing it randomly, so we aren’t going by the register.”

Verge said before he turned to face the smartboard, setting up the PowerPoint. Of course, there would be work set for the rest of the class, whilst he was going through the speaking tests.

“Thank god, I’m mates with you, sitting next to you and my speaking partner.”

Logan gave another grin which caused Arthur to push his shoulder playfully.

“Dude, I’m from Monaco, sort of different French, compared to Verge’s full-on French.”

This made Logan roll his eyes again,

“Doesn’t matter, its still French and its not like Nat 5 is being super specific.”

“I suppose so, anyway let's go through all of this, I don’t want to be told off because we have actually practised. You made the notes, didn’t you?”

Arthur asked as he watched Logan pull out his workbook and flipping through until he came to the page with the notes about speaking. Arthur liked working with Logan, the American was fun and willing to laugh, but he also was hard working. That was helpful because it was hard for Arthur to focus sometimes and Logan helped him out with that. The pair were also in form together, and it always gave him someone to talk to in the mornings.

“Something else is still up? You looked sad when Vergne said he was getting married. What’s wrong? You can tell me; I promise I won’t tell anyone if its something terrible or embarrassing.”

Logan asked as the pair headed out of the class. Arthur gave another sigh; maybe he could tell Logan? Afterall Logan and Oscar hadn’t been a couple for that long. A month at a guess, or was it two?

“I need to ask you something, and I need your honest answer. Like a really honest answer.”

He said as the pair made their way out in the yard, watching all the other years. He could also see Charles and Pierre and their group. He didn’t want to be a nightmare by bothering them, so his friends seemed like a good option instead.

“Okay, shoot.”

Logan gave a genuine smile, and that spurred him on.

“I like Jean-Luc. I’ve liked him since the S3 disco at the end of last year.

“Finally.”

Logan gave a grin before Arthur shot him a look of confusion.

“Wait, what do you mean finally?”

“Myself, Oscar, Fred and Enzo have basically been saying this since the S3 disco. Gianluca likes you as well. I mean he told Oscar that after he broke up with his girlfriend, he was thinking and he realised that he liked you as well. He just wasn’t sure that you felt the same. It's cute and way overdue. No actually, it's okay because it means that Oscar and I have a little bit of time to be the power-couple of this group. Now you and Gianluca have a chance to overthrow us, and I don’t mind that thought.”

“Oh, I didn’t think about that. I need advice though, how did you ask Oscar out, in the first place?”

“He was the one that asked me out. It was after mocks; I hadn’t done brilliant in maths, he hugged me. Had a heart to heart, admitted that we both liked each other. Still not sure, how we got to that. Anyway, he asked me out, and we went out for pizza on Saturday. We have been together ever since. So be honest with him.”

“Okay.”

“Perfect, you feel better, that you’ve gotten that off your chest then?”

“Much better.”

* * *

It turned out that it did take a while for Arthur actually to ask Gianluca out. That was until the pair of them were lying on Arthur’s bedroom floor, a few weeks later on a Saturday, trying to do work but they weren’t.

“So I guess Charles and Pierre aren’t doing work then?”

Arthur lifted his head at Gianluca’s comment, and that was when he heard the sound of Charles and Pierre laughing, the music loudly coming from Charles’ room across the hall.

“Yeah, I guess they aren’t. Do you believe in soulmates?”

“Why do you ask that?”

“Don’t know, just been thinking that recently. Think the whole Verge and Lotterer inspired it.”

“Oh yeah, that. Do you think if Verge does invite his Nat 5 French class, you’ll be allowed to bring along a date?”

“Maybe, I’m not sure. Do you want me to bring you then?”

“Potentially, I think it would fun. Lotterer has a sort of obligation. I mean he is the year head for S4s. Also, we could make it much more fun. Don’t look at me, like that. It’s a good idea. Plus seeing teachers outside of the school environment would be fun as well. Also could just film drunk teachers.”

“That’s not what good S4s are supposed to do.”

“Who said anything about being good S4s?”

“I hate you so much right now. What was it my mama said when she met you?”

“Oh that I’m a good influence and that she’s happy we’re friends. Your mama’s cool. Well, she did say the same thing about Pierre. I know she still says that I mean Pierre has a place at St Andrews, for law of all things. Like that’s hard.”

“Yeah, but it is true, though. You’ve certainly helped me with studying and stuff.”

“Dude I’m happy to do it. Feels like I’m doing something good. Plus it helps me make sure I understand everything.”

“Are we having a deep heart to heart right now?”

“I suppose we are. Don’t mind it though. I like talking to you about basically everything under the sun.”

“I like doing that as well. As much as I like talking to the others, talking with you just feels different.”

“In a good or bad way?”

“A good way, promise.”

“I’ll take your word for it then.”

“Oh come on, how long have we known each other for?”

“Since we were in P7, so a good few years.”

“See, since we were kids.”

Arthur tilted his head to look at Gianluca who had shuffled closer to him, so the pair were looking right into each other's eyes. There was little space between them now, and Gianluca’s face was a few inches away from his. He could also feel the tension between the two of them, the conversation had trailed off and leaving them in silence.

“ I was wondering, though if I could ask you something?”

Arthur took a deep breath before looking into Gianluca’s eyes.

“Sure, go ahead.”

“I like you, as I want to go on dates with you. Hold your hand in the yard, be able to lean into you, as Oscar does with Logan.”

He froze as he watched the information passing through Gianluca’s head before he gave a smile,

“You know what? I like you too; I want to go dates with you as well. Be the best relationship within S4. So would you be willing to go out with me, Arthur Leclerc?”

Arthur laughed before nodding,

“I would love to, Jean- Luc.”

“Can I kiss you then?”

“Yeah”

Gianluca then fully closed the gap between them by pressing his lips to Arthur’s who wrapped his arms around Gianluca’s neck. The pair stayed like that for a while, Gianluca wrapping his arms around Arthur’s waist. The pair breaking apart for breath before laughing, and resting their foreheads together. They were so absorbed in their own little bubble that they didn’t hear the multiple calls from downstairs. They only broke apart when they heard a familiar voice.

“About time, see I told you, Charles, if we left them to their own devices, they’d figured out that they liked each other. You two coming then? Pascale has made lunch.”

Pierre said, leaning on the doorframe looking at the pair of them with a smile, whilst Charles was leaning into him with a massive grin on his face.

“Seems like your growing up then, baby brother. Anyway, welcome to this family then, I guess, Gianluca.”

At this comment, the pair made their way downstairs, leaving the two boys lying on the floor before they slowly sat up, before laughing as they got to their feet.

“So, that was awkward.”

Gianluca gave a smile before Arthur took his hand as the pair headed downstairs.

“Yeah, it is sort of a thing you need to get used to though. People in this house can turn up at the wrong times and ruin everything. Trust me; it happens all the time.”

“Oh, right. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Yeah, it’s a good idea. Just make sure that we don’t do anything that could be used as blackmail purposes.”

“Oh”

“Yeah, we are one of those families. Anyway, come on.”

Arthur pulled Gianluca along and into the kitchen where he could see his mum standing talking to Pierre and Charles. She gave a small smile when she saw the two younger boys.

“Hello, you two. I see that you two have figured out your feelings.”

This caused Arthur to groan before Pascale laughed.

“Sweetie, I’m your mother, I notice these things. Also, your still mon bébé and I want you to be happy.”

“Thanks, Mama”

Arthur gave a small smile before letting go of Gianluca and slowly making his way over to Pascale, who had her arms open and pulled him into a tight hug.

“She was like this as well, when Charles told her, we were dating.”

Pierre laughed as a way of explanation when he saw Gianluca look confused.

Pascale also pulled Gianluca into a hug after she let Arthur go.

“Welcome to the family,”

She whispered as she gave Gianluca a tight hug, which made him smile.


	6. The Birds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a flock of birds in the school, and everyone is panicking. Its not good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, so this is the final one for now.  
> So this is based on the time that a bird flew into one of the classrooms, I was in and everybody freaked out. i wrote it as many group chats because I thought it worked better.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you enjoy  
> Scottie Dog  
> xx

The mad lads' squad- Alex, George, Lando, Max, Charles and Pierre

Lando- Um guys

George- What?

Lando- Slight issue, but there's a bird in the comm.

Max- What do you mean a bird?

Lando- Dude, it's a bird. Like a real bird (sends photo)

Pierre- Geesh that's a big bird.

Lando- I know, please send help. I have no idea what to do.

George- Why are you texting us then?

Lando- I don't know, it seemed like the sensible idea. I mean we even brought in reinforcements.

Max- And by that, you mean the S5s.

Lando- Yes, I mean I'm currently witnessing Callum Ilott trying to catch it with a net.

George- Where the hell did, he get the net?

Lando- I'm not questioning it; I'm not getting involved with it.

Alex- And by that, he means he's sitting in one of the bigger lockers.

Max- How the hell did you manage that one?

Lando- I'm small enough apparently. Plus, it's the safest place.

Alex- I mean, it kinda is a mess right now. Oh, great, its flown down out of the comm. Get ready lads; you might start to be hearing some screaming right now.

George- Oh yeah, I can hear it now. Oh, now Horner looking confused.

Pierre- So is Abiteboul.

Max- This is going to be fun, oh I can now see Callum with the net and Marcus following him.

* * *

The Chaotic mess- Mick, Robert, Callum, Christian and Jüri

Mick- Can one of you jokers, please explain to me why Callum is running down the corridor with a massive net?

Christian- Oh he's trying to catch the bird that's managed to get into the comm. It is causing quite a mess. Like it's a big bird.

Robert- Oh god, this is the mouse all over again. Oh, it looks like Vettel is confused. Oh, and there's the screaming, along with the growing number of people.

Marcus- So as you can hear, there is a bird loose, I'm currently taking a break so I can type this.

Mick- Where did your boyfriend get the net?

Marcus- I have no idea. Oh, and there's another one.

Robert- Wait, what?

Jüri- Um, yeah about that. One flew in after we had the window open cause it was baking in the English classroom. Unfortunately, Juan came back from the toilet and opened the door. Then the bird flew out. So, we started to chase it. Sorry.

Christian- Well, this is undoubtedly more interesting.

Mick- Oh god, well I'm not leaving this classroom for my safety. I don't want to be trampled to death.

Marcus- Dude, you're not going to be trampled to death. You're tall enough not to be pushed down.

Mick- I'm not taking any chances.

Robert- You know what? I'm so done with all of this.

Jüri- That's rich seeing as you aren't even involved with this. It is a workout though, oh no, no-no.

Christian- What do you mean by that?

Marcus- Err, there are more than two birds.

Callum- Um, taking a quick break from this chasing. Passed the net on. Now I see there are four birds.

Mick- How the hell, has it gone up to four birds?

Callum- Honestly, I have no idea. All I know is that we are going to need more people.

Robert- Are the teachers not getting involved?

Marcus- No, we're adults apparently. They're leaving us to it.

Christian- And our parents pay money for us to go to this school.

* * *

Nat 5s, a draining life force- Arthur, Enzo, Gianluca, Logan, Oscar, Fred

Arthur- Why is there a ton of screaming?

Enzo- There are a few birds lose in the corridor

Logan- How do you know that?

Enzo- I had a doctor's appointment, came in and saw Callum running down the corridor with a net, like a giant net.

Logan- Where did he get the net?

Enzo- I have no idea; there are a ton of people.

Arthur- It's S5s and S6s. Cause I just saw Charles run down the corridor as well

Gianluca- You know you can't use that as justification to prove you're the smarter Leclerc.

Arthur- I'm offended now,

Logan- He is right, though.

Arthur- Oh come on, I am getting like top marks in Verge's class.

Gianluca- That's because you're fluent in French. Also, if I am to be reminded that was the whole reason why you chose French.

Enzo- He does have a point.

Arthur- I hate all of you right now.

Oscar- Not to alarm you or anything but myself and Fred are walking back over from Chemistry, and we've noticed that there are four birds.

Fred- And to top that off, they're quite big.

Gianluca- This is a nightmare; you know this means that we are going to trapped in here.

Logan- Well I mean it's that, or we are getting involved.

Arthur- I'm not doing that. I have a reputation to uphold.

Gianluca- I love you dearly, but your reputation is that you are equally as hopeless as Charles and the truly smartest Leclerc is Lorenzo.

Arthur- Do not mention that name.

Oscar- He's your brother. Do you guys have that bad of a relationship?

Enzo- No, they have a good relationship.

Gianluca- It's just the fact that both he and Charles have a thing where they aren't willing to accept that the fact that Lorenzo is the smart one of the family.

Arthur- I mean he's doing a chemistry degree like that's hard.

Logan- Oh well I mean we still love you, Arthur, I mean you are my shining halo. For Nat 5 French.

Arthur- Thanks, Logan, see Jean-Luc, I am respected and appreciated in this group chat.

Gianluca- Oh, Logan, what have you done?

Fred- Don't want to worry you boys, but there is still all the issues with all the birds.

* * *

The sane ones in this place- Jamie, Tatiana, Charlotte, Cate, Lily and Dilara

Tatiana- Why did Lily just run down the corridor screaming? Like should I be worried?

Charlotte- There's a few birds lose and its causing meltdowns all over the place, and Lily happens to have been swept up in this all.

Charlotte- Her and Alex really do everything together. Even chasing down wildlife.

Jamie- Where are you exactly to be witnessing this?

Cate- Oh myself and Charlotte are standing in the hallway, from the English department to the social science corridor. That seems to be where most of the activity is taking place.

Jamie- I'm taking that neither of you is involved in the chase.

Charlotte- You would be correct in that.

Tatiana- Where's Dilara? I feel like that this would be a thing she'd involved in

Cate- She's not feeling well, so she went home after lunch.

Jamie- Right.

Cate- I don't want to be nosy, but how are you getting away with being on your phones? Like wouldn't you be caught at this point?

Jamie- Yeah but you forget. I have English, and therefore I have Hamilton. He's currently standing in the corridor talking to Vettel. Oh and there goes Callum and the lads.

Charlotte- Please, god, don't tell me you're thinking about joining the mob.

Tatiana- I'm up for it if you are?

Jamie- Oh, defiantly.

Cate- You know what, why the hell not? Are you coming, Charlie?

Charlotte- You know, I hate it when you call me that, but fine babes.

Tatiana- Let's go then.

* * *

Lewis watched with a sigh as he saw a few figures managing to slip out of his class. He wasn't going to stop them, not with all this bird trouble. Let them get their energy out.

"Please don't do anything stupid. Please"

He called as he watched them go, getting a few calls of reassurance.

"The same has happened with my lot."

Seb gave a sigh causing Lewis to laugh,

"Am I that surprised. Any opportunity for madness gets taken with both hands. We just need to make sure that somebody doesn't hurt themselves."

The pair stood for a few minutes before they were greeted by Jev coming over to them.

"I see that your classes have broken down then."

“Same issue with yours?”

Lewis gave a tired smile.

“I have a bunch of S4s who are having their soul drained from their bodies. It gets some energy out of them, which is good, I suppose.”

Jev gave another smile before they heard some more screams, there was a larger number now.

“Oh for the love of God. I thought you were one of my sensible students, Mick.”

Seb sighed as he saw Mick and Robert run past, both of them pausing and offering sympathetic smiles.

“Sorry, Sir, but this is massive, and we need to make sure that nobody in our friendship group hurts themselves. I even managed to get Mick to agree to it.”

Robert gave a sheepish smile with Mick nodding before the pair bolted off again, yelling again.

* * *

The mad lads’ squad

George- So it seems that the Leclerc's have united

Max- Is that a good or bad thing?

Pierre- It highly depends on how you think about it. Oh and there goes Lando as well. He felt that it was a smart idea to jump onto Sacha’s back. His little legs couldn’t keep up.

George- Oh, it is now making sense. Like a lot of sense.

Max- What's making sense?

George- People are jumping onto the backs of their partners. Such as Lily who has her legs wrapped around Alex’s waist. I saw them running down the corridor as well.

Pierre- I’ve been ditched by my lovely boyfriend.

Max- You can always come and chill with us.

Pierre- Ah yes, the two with boyfriends at Uni.

George- I’ve sent photos to Nicky. He’s finding the whole thing hilarious. Where are you, anyway?

Max- We’re standing at the top of the main stairs. We can get a view of everything. I think the teachers have given up at this point.

Pierre- Language corridor. Oh its clear, making a run for it boys.

Lando- Alright lads?

Max- Oh, how is it, in the thick of it?

Lando- Alright, would you believe it? Sacha found me in the locker, and now we’ve joined the chase as a backup.

Charles- Not by choice or anything. I’ve joined forces with the S4s, and we roped the two of them in.

George- Well this is making Tuesday far more interesting.

Charles- Oh god, yeah it is only Tuesday. Right, I’ll keep you posted lads.

Max- Why does this feel vaguely like some war?

* * *

The chaotic mess

Marcus- I see the tides have turned.

Mick- The only reason we’re doing this is that we don’t you to hurt yourself.

Christian- Ok so I, Juan and Jüri, have got the birds in our sights.

Callum- That’s going to end badly, and every single one of us knows it.

Jüri- You don’t have enough fate in us. It’ll be fine.

Robert- Says the guy that tried to push the door that said pull on it. Also, it seems that you made that mistake so many times.

Mick- Oh yeah, I forgot about this.

Chrisitan- So um, the birds flew over our heads.

Callum- What did I say? Marcus ready to go again?

Marcus- Yep. Let's go. See you later, lads.

Christian- Somebody is going to get hurt, and everyone knows it.

Jüri- It’ll be fine, anyway let's go.

Robert- This is going to end horribly, and we all know that deep down.

* * *

Nat 5s, a draining life force

Oscar- So the Leclercs have joined forces, it amazes me that Charles is the older one. He doesn’t act like it.

Gianluca- Yeah, I’d agree with you there. I’ve been friends for Arthur for years, and I can validate that fact.

Fred- Should I be worried or impressed by that fact?

Gianluca- It's up to you to make that their decision.

Oscar- Anyway, so there is still the issue of the flock of birds.

Fred- Yeah, we are calling it a flock because there’s more than one.

Enzo- I think we’ve figured that one out fairly early on.

Oscar- Ok, anyway so I’m currently standing watching Charles and Arthur trying to catch one of the birds. I will tell you; it looks like a mess.

Logan- Yeah, it’s a big mess. The pair of us are not getting involved in the chaos.

Enzo- Yeah, I'm slightly worried now. Like are they really the best people to be doing this.

Fred- Can you name a better pair then?

Enzo- Easy, myself and Pietro.

Gianluca- Yeah, guess so, but he’s at Uni so let's go with who is around.

Enzo- Ok fine, still think we’d be better as this.

Oscar- Oh.

Fred- What's happened.

Oscar- So the Leclercs have managed to get one of the birds out the window, but because they are Leclercs, they’ve been attacked.

Logan- In what sense do you mean attacked?

Oscar- Um, well I mean, me and Arthur are currently are at the nurse as the bird pecked him quite hard, and he has a bleeding wound. Like it was an aggressive bird.

Gianluca- Surely if the bird attacked them, they might have been doing something wrong? Birds aren't meant to attack you like that.

Arthur- Well I mean regular birds don’t do this, and this one was massive, and it was giving me the evils. I mean it was only a matter of time. We all knew that.

Fred- You're acting overdramatic again.

Arthur- I was being attacked; I was trying to defend myself. Each man for himself.

Enzo- Sometimes I wonder why we’re friends with you.

Arthur- Jean-Luc, I'm being bullied.

Gianluca- You're not, we’re doing it out of love. Anyway, you get stitched up and hope that you don’t get attacked by any more birds.

* * *

The sane ones in this place

Lily- So I think I just proved that I am the best girlfriend in this group chat.

Jamie- What makes you believe that?

Lily- I stuck by Alex's side the whole time, this mess was happening. You four only got into the action later.

Tatiana- You had a free period. Jamie and I didn’t; therefore, it took us longer to get out of our classes to join in. Then Charlotte and Cate were just witnessing the madness before they got involved.

Cate- Thanks Tati. Yeah, you were the only one that was even with your significant other when this whole mess started.

Charlotte- Cate and I were at opposite sides of the building.

Lily- Excuses, every one of you.

Dilara- I'm at home, curled up in my bed because I feel unwell. I’m also watching it all on Instagram.

Lily- You're fine Di.

Dilara- XX

Charlotte- Anway, I didn’t think I'd enjoy that as much as I did.

Cate- Aw, always knew there was a wild side in you, Charlie. Oh, and I'm dating her, so I can call her that.

Jamie- Sure. Well I mean we all call her Lottie, which she also doesn’t like.

Charlotte- I only put with it because you’re my friends. Besides we call you J, all the time, then Tatiana, Tati. Lily, Lil and Dilara, Di.

Cate- My name is already shortened.

Lily- We've been aware of that since the start of S1, Cate.

Dilara- I'm kind of sad I missed it all now.

Tatiana- The main thing is that you feel better Di. Also, it was just the boys going a bit mad and the teachers questioning their lives choices which have led them to this point.

Dilara- Oh, so like every other day.

Jamie- Exactly.

* * *

“So I see you all managed to get those birds out but really why did all of you feel the urge to get involved with it?”

Claire sighed as she stood at the front of the stage, standing in front of the whole sixth form, on Wednesday after the bird saga yesterday. It surprised her, how often they behaved like children from time to time. The bird saga was yet more proof of this. At least nobody had gotten hurt that badly. She often wondered why she was given this job role, and on top of that, she had to deal with teachers as well.

She could see one of the S6 raise his hand before she sighed again,

“No, I don’t want to hear anything from anyone of you. Honestly, I have enough to deal with and not have you running havoc by chasing some birds. You're in the sixth form, and really should be setting an example to the younger years. I’m just grateful that none of you has ended up hurt and that we don’t have anything broken.”

“But miss, Arthur Leclerc hurt himself, as he got attacked by one of the birds.”

“Thank you, Marcus, but Arthur is not in the sixth form and therefore has Mr Lotterer as a year head. He will be dealing with that.”

Claire again was grateful that she only had to deal with one Leclerc, she felt sorry for André who had to deal with the younger Leclerc, and the one in the sixth form didn’t have any bird-related injuries.

“Right, off all of you go, and I don’t want you to do anything stupid like this again? Understand?”

She was greeted by a series of yes miss and won't happen again miss, as she watched them all file out of the assembly hall. Take the role of head of the sixth form, they had said. Not only did she have form teachers who disliked each other, but she also had to deal with a bunch of children who were worse than Susie’s S3s. Why did she think this was a good idea, all those years ago?


	7. Uniform checks, deadlines and student teachers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mitch and Alex are two of the student teachers, and they are learning that there are some things that they have to deal with, that aren't taught at Uni.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,  
> Hope your all doing well. This chapter is based on mine and my friends' experiences of student teachers, uniforms and deadlines for dissertations and similar. Most of my experiences with the various student teachers overall were good. So I've decided that all the students in this also have good experiences. The uniform checks happened quite a few times, and my year was often told, that the teachers didn't want us to look scruffy. Uniform enforcement was also a real thing for me. S6s years before me kept getting yelled at because they weren't dressing appropriately for school. So I was still in uniform for S6. Finally deadlines. The teachers often told us they couldn't believe that we didn't understand the basic idea of handing stuff in on time. Most of us were fairly decent at meeting the deadlines, though.  
> Sorry for this bit of a ramble. I might share a few stories of my own time at school, as I only finished this year.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you all enjoy  
> Scottie Dog  
> xx

"Morning, sir."

Alex Lynn gave a small smile as he made his way into the building on Monday. He had been slightly unsure when he'd been given this school for his placement. Sure it had a good reputation, and many student teachers had been sent here before, but good reputations only got you so far, and Alex knew that. Uni was a prime example of that. He wasn't exposing anything that himself and his friends had gotten up to. Especially during that freshers week. However, now he had to be professional, he was in his final year, and he had to perform well to prove that he could get the degree and qualify. He supposed the good thing was, that a lot of the students liked him, and he could understand that from the minute that he walked into their classes and told them that he would be teaching them for several weeks. He was in his early 20s and sometimes having a slightly younger teacher who could sympathize with you and understand you better was a good thing for a student. Alex also had been talking a lot with Lewis and Sebastian, two recently qualified teachers and it was clear that all the students liked them. Well again Roscoe, Lewis' dog was a massive part of this appeal.

"So, I think the higher-ups are testing us. I think they want to see if we can deal with what is considered the hardest thing to achieve in this place successfully."

Mitch greeted Alex as he walked into the staff room, the student teachers happened to be a sort of group who remained together at the lunch and stuff. This had been noticed and of course, S4, S5 and S6, had decided to start quoting 'friends' from the inbetweeners at them. Alex felt a little sorry for the younger years who clearly had no idea what the older ones were talking about. However, the younger years, the S1s and S2s liked to make it clear they didn't have to sit exams. The S3s had given up because the reality of Nat 5s had hit them. Even if they didn't have to sit exams, it still wasn't that fun. Alex didn't have the heart to tell them that exams just got worse after that.

This again was another thing that they didn't teach you at Uni, a bunch of teenagers trying to find any way possible to annoy the teachers. It also wasn't taught that they targeted student teachers because they were new and weren't aware of the full ins and outs of this place. It was also down to the older and more experienced teachers having wised up to it, and sending said offender/s to detention. Most student teachers didn't do that, and honestly, Alex didn't mind it that much. As long as it wasn't anything mean, hurtful, disrespectful or inappropriate, they could say it. Most of the time, it was just Tiktoks or something someone had seen online or something. Occasionally there was the odd TV reference as well. They also were often amazed when Alex understood it all. His reply, of course, being, 'I'm only in my early 20s. I'm not that much older than you.'

"What do you mean?"

He asked as a few other student teachers came over,

"We've been asked to do a random uniform check, and we all know how much they all hate uniform check. The unform level has slightly slipped, and well, that's explanation enough."

Mitch sighed before the others nodded,

Mitch Evans was cool, well according to Marcus Armstrong in S5, who had been delighted when he'd discovered that Mitch was from New Zealand. Even if the kid had been in Scotland since he was a toddler, he still had an unmistaken Kiwi accent. It honestly amazed everyone, the amount of S5s and S6s who had been living here since they were kids, still had their native countries accents. It had confused Alex at first when he was trying to understand a lot of them, but they were willing to help him, again showing that they liked him.

"How bad are we talking here?"

Another student teacher Robin asked, already looking like he was regretting that he had to do this.

"In the grand scale of things, not that bad. I mean the worst one according to some of the teachers that have been here for ages, was a few years ago when the S6s kept breaking all the own clothes dress codes. Higher-ups got fed up and have enforced uniform all the way up. Still, in the words of the head, 'we don't want our students looking scruffy.' I really don't want to bother the kids, but we still have to do it."

Mitch gave another sigh which caused the others to nod, yes the joys of uniform checks, a collective thing that students hated.

"Oh well, I suppose I'd better get going. Let me know how your checks go."

Alex gave a smile making the others give their own thumbs up to Alex as he headed out of the staff room.

"Hello sir, how are you."

Alex gave a small smile as he walked into his AH English class. At least this class at least understood the basic concept of wearing your uniform correctly. He certainly knew of a few teachers who had classes where that concept was not understood.

"I’m okay, right morning class. Today we are going over your dissertations. I expect you to have at least looked at the deadline guidelines surrounding them. Most of you should hopefully be on your second or third drafts. Now I know that mocks have taken up a lot of your time, but they are all done and dusted. So I hope that you know all focus should now be on the dissertations. The rest of the English department and I are still expecting a vast number of dissertations. At least four or five belong to this class, but I won't say who. You know who you are, though. Right, the other thing I want to say is that we are also going to be doing a unform check. Most of you seem to be alright, but I am going to do a few call-outs. Charles, please tuck your shirt in, Lance can you sort out your tie, Charlotte your skirt is way too short, so if you could unroll it, that would be brilliant, and I thought I told you before but Dilara, your tights still have a large number of ladders, so please if, if possible, could you get some new tights? Right, I think that’s everything, I need to comment on.”

A few expected groans greeted this comment, but Alex could see all of the mentioned students sorting themselves out. It just so happened that Charlotte had a spare pair of tights that she gave to Dilara.

“Yes, Dilara you can go to the toilets to change your tights but be quick.”

Alex said when he noticed her raising her hand,

“I’ll be quick sir, I promise.”

She smiled before getting to her feet and walking out of the classroom, her shoes squeaking on the floor, showing that she was running, or at least speed walking. That was another thing Alex had learnt. Students had a habit of running down the corridors when they were in a rush, and quite often, their rucksacks turning into weights tilting them back if they were running fast enough. It was bad enough when they only had one bag; it was worse when they started added bags. It surprised Alex, how much these kids could carry.

* * *

“So I’ve seen the word has spread then?”

Alex groaned as Mitch laughed as the pair were walking in the corridor during lunch, the pair again liked hanging out during their breaks. They were from different universities, but it was accepted that student teachers from all unis across Scotland were sent to a selection of schools. It gave them a good chance to meet some other student teachers, and some had made friends, and a lucky few had ended up in relationships. Alex and Mitch happened to be two of those people. They had only recently gotten together, so it was a fledgeling relationship.

“Yeah, it always amazes me how quickly stuff like this gets shared.”

“It’s like they have their own underground supply line where all this information gets spread. Wait, I know the S6s and S5 have whole year group chats. Well, I have one with the English department, and there are student teachers ones.”

“What do you talk about on the English one then?”

Mitch asked, looking at Alex curiosity clear on his face.

“Oh, not that much, I think you find interesting. At the moment, it's just complaining about S6s who don’t understand the concept of deadlines and having to hand things in on time.”

Mitch gave another laugh as Alex said this, it being clear that the idea of S6s doing on things time was an impossible thing for them. At least most of Alex’s AH did understand how to stick to deadlines, well most of the time anyway. It was hard trying to scare the living daylights out of a bunch of 17 and 18-year-olds to make them hand stuff in on time. It sounded bad, but that turned out to be way more useful for the S4s, Alex wasn’t mean enough to scare the S1s, S2 and the S3s were just trying to get used to it all. They thankfully were willing to follow the deadlines for some of their work; it was trying to instil that mentality into them, which was the hard bit.

Alex wasn’t worried about that for now, though, he was more concerned with them trying to understand it all. It also amazed him how bad a lot of all the classes’ spelling was. Unfortunately the issue of ‘But sir, English isn’t my first language so I can’t be expected to understand the ins and outs of English grammar’ kept being brought up. The response that he had to give was of course that all of them had been in Scotland, writing in English for years.

“The other main thing on the chat at the moment is trying to get Lewis to go on a date with Seb. We’ve been telling him to do it for a while. I mean even the students have spotted this.”

Alex smiled again, making Mitch laugh. Mitch had a nice laugh, and just understood Alex and everything that came with being a student teacher, dealing with some slightly annoying children and teenagers. That was also a huge reason why Alex and Mitch were keeping their relationship quiet because the lovely lot from S3 upwards had a habit of finding this stuff out, proceeding to dig and then trying to ‘help’. Despite being still in his early 20s, he didn’t fully understand the mindset of these teenagers. He did know; however, there were a few S6s, S5s and S4s that he needed to avoid because those kids were the worse at doing stuff like that. He was also aware that two of those S6s Charles Leclerc and Charlotte Sine were in his AH class. They were both smart when they put their minds to it and were willing to work. In fact, both of their dissertations were decent, and it was clear that they had spent time on them. The issue was that they liked getting involved in everything that wasn’t work-related.

“So now that’s going then? I like hearing stuff about our fellow teachers' lives. Shows that even as adults, we all have the same issues that we had as teenagers.”

Mitch gave another laugh as the pair made their way towards the staff room,

“I think we have managed to convince Lewis to at least go for a drink at some point this weekend. Don’t let that word out though because you know what those kids are like.”

Alex gave a smile before the pair saw a few of the kids walking past the staff room.

“Hello, Mr Lynn and Mr Evans. You’ll be pleased to know and see that we have sorted out our unforms.”

Marcus Armstrong said with a massive grin whilst Callum Illot had his arm around his shoulder, their bags swung on their shoulders. The pair had tucked in their shirts, had their ties correctly on, and they also had their blazers on as well. Marcus had even brushed his hair a bit.

“The question is though Marcus, how long that will last for. I have a feeling that you’ll have that shirt untucked at this time next week.”

Mitch sighed before the two S5s laughed before looking at the two student teachers,

“Sir trust me, I will keep an eye on Marcus and make sure that he manages to keep himself semi-presentable, at least for a few more weeks.”

Callum smiled again, at least Callum was one of the few who looked semi-presentable at all times. Mitch had mentioned the fact to Alex before he was relieved that Marcus was dating Callum as he managed to make sure Marcus didn’t do anything too stupid.

“Thank you, Callum; I also wanted to say that I’ve read over your assessment and I’m impressed.”

Mitch gave another smile which made Callum look surprised. Mitch was a design and technology student teacher, and the assessment part of that was hard.

“Thanks, sir, I’m glad that it’s okay.”

“Right, you two should head off to your classes, even though you two are always good to talk to.”

Marcus and Callum headed off, their shoes making the classic squeaky noise on the floor, which meant that they were running or speed walking at least.

“I see that this is also the other thing that nobody in this school understands, what is so hard to grasp about the idea of not running in corridors. Well, I’m not dealing with the issue of people tripping over.”

Alex laughed again, clearly tired with the mess that was the sixth form and he had only been here for a month at tops. 

“How does Claire put up with this on a daily bias?”

“She’s not human, or she has the patience of a saint. It's likely a mix of both, in all honestly. I aspire to be that level of composed.”

This made Mitch bust out laughing as the pair walked into the staff room where they saw Claire standing talking to a few other teachers before she gave a small smile and walked over when she saw the two standing there.

“Hello, you two. How are you finding all of this? It’s a little bit of mess most of the time, but I promise that being a teacher is one of the most rewarding things there is. I know I sound like one of those government teaching ads, but it’s true.”

This made the two student teachers laugh again,

“You sure you’re not secretly paid off by the British or Scottish government to say this. Make sure we don’t regret our life decisions that we’ve made this far. Recruit us into this.”

Mitch laughed before Claire sighed,

“Trust me, Mitch, if either government were paying me off, I wouldn’t be here. I’ll be honest with you here lads, but a lot of the time I do question why I decided to become a teacher and why I also decided to take the role of head of the sixth form. The thing is though, in the long run, I don’t regret it. Even if those kids are trouble, they mean well and they are good kids. I’m sure you’ve already learnt that from all your classes. I was also going to say, thanks for doing the uniform checks. I know its not fun but its just one of those things we have to do. My word of advice is that it’ll be hard, you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, but then sometimes a kid will say something that’ll make your day. Its honestly the best and worst career at the same time.”

Claire laughed with a smile before she waved at them as she started to leave the staff room,

“I’ve got some lovely S4s to go and teach, so I’ll see you guys later.”

She looked slightly tired. It was well known amongst the teachers that Claire hated Wednesdays, she had S3s before lunch and then S4s after lunch. Mitch and Alex had respect for her with that timetable.

“So what year have you got next then?”

Mitch asked, making Alex give a smile,

“Higher so I’ll let you know if Marcus has managed to keep his uniform presentable. What about you?”

“Nat 5, we’ve moved onto the actual technical side of things. Making stuff is always the fun part of the course. The kids are all excited as we’re using the 3D printer. I’m just hoping that we can get the computer program working because I do not need it crashing.”

“Good luck with that. We’re going over poetry. The worst part of the course, according to basically everyone in the class. I don’t blame them; it is dull; our reading text is so much more interesting. Plus it's an excuse to get the kids reading aloud. It helps them build their confidence even if they hate doing it at the start.”

Mitch gave a smile before pressing a quick kiss on Alex’s lips.

“I’ll see you later then. Have fun”

He said before he headed off, making Alex nod.

“See you later, as well.”

* * *

Alex then headed out of the staff room in a good mood. Unfortunately, this good mood was crushed when he entered the classroom and saw Marcus had his shirt untucked.

“Honestly Marcus, you can’t even have your shirt tucked in for that long. Your hopeless.”

“Sorry sir, it just sort of happened.”

Marcus sheepishly smiled before Alex waved his hand, dismissing it.

“At least you’ve managed to keep your tie on. That’s something I suppose.”

“Thanks, Sir.”


	8. Camp and the experiences over the years

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The different experiences for the different students who were around in P7 of their outdoor bounds camp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone,  
> Hope your all doing well. So, before I do my little run down about this shot, I want to go on a little rant. I’m sure you are all aware of Max Verstappen’s recent actions regarding the use of the r-word on his radio. I have three diagnosed learning disabilities (Dyspraxia, Dyslexia and Dis-calculus. I don’t mind sharing them with people if it comes up. It's one of the ways that I deal with having them) and have had these diagnoses since about the age of 4 or 5, (I’m 18, so I have always been aware of them.) and this comment really made me lose respect for him, especially after he refused to apologize. However, I am also aware that he is a character within these shots, and I want to address it. This is a work of fiction and I always feel that you create a fictionalized version of a person, even if they are real, so my own fictional version of Max is different to the real-life version of him. Therefore, I will carry on writing him in this universe, as isn't associated with real life. Hope that all makes sense, I wanted to get this off my chest. 
> 
> This shot regards our lovely three chaos groups at P7 camp. P7 camp was one of my favourite school memories. You and the rest of your year at the age of 11 go off on an outdoor bounds' week, where you do all these different outdoor activities. The three activities mentioned in this shot, are all activities that myself and my year did at the time when I went to camp. Not sure if it was different for other schools, but I'm going off what my school did. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy, feel free to leave comments and kudos. I like reading all your comments
> 
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3. 
> 
> Scottie Dog 
> 
> xx

P7- Lando, George, Alex, Lily, Sacha, Cate, Charlotte

“Right, does everybody have everything, because when we are gone, we are gone for the week. We aren’t coming back until Friday.”

Lando grinned as he heard the teacher’s voice calling out, making sure that there wasn’t anything being left behind. He had everything, and he was looking forward to the camp. He was going away for the week, and there were a ton of activities that he got to do. Olli, his older brother, had told him that camp was brilliant. The only issue was that one of his friends had fallen out of his bunk bed trying to get rid of a spider and broken his wrist. So of course, Lando had been told to behave and make sure that he didn’t do anything like that.

“Right, I want you to promise me that you aren’t going to cause trouble or anything that will cause something bad to happen.”

Lando nodded his head before his mum pulled into a tight hug before letting him go. He then picked up his big bag with all of his clothes and stuff taking it over to be placed onto the coach. He then raced over to give his mum, one final hug goodbye before making his way over to the line of kids to get registered as they headed up onto the coach, his backpack swaying slightly as he climbed up the steps.

“Right, that’s you ticked off Lando, your all good to go.”

Lando smiled at the teacher before he made his way along, trying to find his friends.

“Lando”

He turned his head to see George grinning, motioning to the empty seat beside him, which made Lando sit down next to George.

“Hi, you ready to go then?”

He asked, which caused George to nod his head. George had been talking about camp for the last week, which was different from Lando. He had been a little worried about it, but he knew that it was going to fun. Also, they had been allowed to choose the people they were staying in rooms with. Lando was relieved that he was with Alex, George and Sacha.

“Where’s Alex?”

He asked before he spotted Alex and Lily walking over to the empty seats in front of them.

“Hey, you guys looking forward to this camp? I’ve heard really cool things about it.”

Lily gave a small smile pushing her hair back from her face. Lily Muni had joined in P6, and the three boys had accepted her into their group, along with Sacha who had also joined in P6. Lando and George were also convinced that Alex liked Lily, but they weren’t sure if Lily liked him back. They weren’t going to say anything, because that was mean and you didn’t do that.

“Yeah, my older brother has told me that it was amazing, who are you sharing a room with?”

Lando asked before Lily gave a small smile,

“I’m sharing with Charlotte and Cate. Everyone had already chosen people to share with, but we got told that there was one of the rooms that was smaller with two bunkbeds and so we were given the go-ahead. I’m happy that it turned out that way, though I don’t want to share with somebody who I don’t know that well.”

Lily said, making the boys nod. They understood that it wasn’t fun sharing things with people that you weren’t friends with. Plus Charlotte and Cate were fun, even if the two girls were a bit annoying some of the time. The boys didn’t hang out with the girls that often, but they were happy enough to put into groups with them for group work.

“Right so I’m sure you all understand the rules about this trip. So I won’t go into that; instead, I want to tell you, the groups that you are going to be in, for the week. All of the groups will be mixed, so I don’t want to hear any complaints understand?”

All of the kids turned their heads when they heard the teacher’s voice. All now interested in who they were going to be spending most of their time with.

“Right, Alex, George, Lando, Sacha, Lily, Charlotte and Cate. You’re group 10.”

* * *

“Come on, Lando, it’ll be fine. Just take a deep breath and push yourself off.”

Lando heard the instructor’s voice before he took a deep breath and slowly started to push himself a little, creating space between himself and the side of the hill,

“That’s it, Lando, now you just need to lengthen the rope and slowly let yourself down. There we go.”

Lando started doing that, carefully lowering himself down to the ground before unclipping the rope from the climbing harness and also his helmet as well. He was pulling it off as he made his way over to the groups gathered along with the path, finding the only other member of the group who had successfully abseiled down, Lily.

“Hey, well done for doing that, even if it was a bit scary.”

She gently squeezed his shoulder.

“Thanks, I’m glad that I’ve done that and I was at the front of the line. I know George was near the back.”

He gave a small smile before Lily reached out to hold onto his arm as he was still shaking a little.

“Yeah, wouldn’t want to be them. Here, hold onto me until everything stops swaying, ok? Don’t want you falling over.”

She carefully moved herself so Lando could hold onto her arm and then gingerly gripped her shoulder. Lily gave a small nod before he tightened his grip a little. The pair then shuffled around so they could get a better view of the hill, to see the others taking their turns to abseil down. The next person they could see at the front of the queue, having the main climbing rope attached to his climbing harness was Alex. They watched as he carefully made his way down, going a little quicker than Lando, bouncing off the hill, clearly enjoying it.

“He has an unfair advantage, but don’t tell him I said that.”

Lando muttered as he let his hand drop from Lily’s shoulder as the ground had stop swaying.

“Oh, the height thing, right? Not sure if that gives you an advantage.”

She looked at Lando with a confused smile, before the pair watched Alex bounce over.

“Hey, you two. Glad that’s done and dusted. Wouldn’t mind doing it again though. How about you two?”

Lando looked shocked; how could somebody want to do that again.

“I’ll take that as no, then Lando. How about you, Lil?”

Alex playfully swung his arm around Lando’s shoulder before Lily gave a small laugh.

“Wouldn’t chose it myself but wouldn’t mind to do it again. I like doing things that allow me to have both my feet on the ground.”

Lando looked as betrayed as an 11 year could when he heard Lily’s answer. They could then hear the sound of another person being connected and making their way down quickly. They all turned and were surprised to see Charlotte being the one sliding down, bouncing as she made her way down, she was supposed to be the one that wasn’t looking forward to it. Lando felt even more betrayed when he saw that she had a massive smile on her face as she unclipped, and pulling off her helmet, retying her hair into its ponytail.

“That was fun; it wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. Right, so that’s four of us done then.”

She laughed as she bounded over. It was fairly clear that the remaining members of their group were also getting closer to having their turns. Sacha came down first, followed by Cate and finally George. Unfortunately for Lando, the remaining three all also looked like they had fun doing it.

“Right, well done you lot. I know some of you didn’t want to do it when we came up here, and I explained what we were going to do, but I’m happy that all of you have done it. We're going to give you a break until lunch; then I want all of you to be in the main hall at 1 pm. Understand?”

The instructor asked before letting the kids rush past and towards back the main building.

“Right boys, I’m going to love you and leave you, but I have some stuff to sort out.”

Charlotte smiled before she raced up the stairs towards the dorms, leaving the rest of the group standing there.

“Looks like that’s her dramatic side there.”

Cate sighed before she ran her fingers threw her hairs gently tugging her own hair out of its ponytail, before handing the hair tie to George who was standing next to her, before she pulled her hair up again and shaking her head, making George sigh before he carefully wrapped the tie around her hair before she gave him a small smile.

“Thanks, Georgie. See Charlotte is making a way bigger deal of sorting out her hair. I’m kind of annoyed now actually.”

Cate gave a soft sigh making the boys look at her. As well as the boys got on with the three girls, but the girls defiantly had their own in things. This was the same as the boys as if to prove this point; Cate looked at the boys.

“Lily has her hair in plaits, much smarter than my and Charlotte’s decisions. Lily, I’m getting you to tie-up my hair up tomorrow.”

Lily gave a small nod and an ok.

“Perfect, right, I do need to change my t-shirt though, but I’ll be quick, I promise.”

Cate gave a small smile again before starting to make her way up the stairs before Lily followed. Leaving the four boys standing there, before George turned to the three, he was the sort of undisputed leader, (even though the girls were the leaders, and they weren’t afraid to let the boys know it)

“I think we should also get changed. I mean Lando has mud all over the back of his joggers, and Alex’s t-shirt is all muddy.”

George looked up and down the boys before they all sighed,

“You and I, Sacha are fine. Come on.”

He said before Alex perked up,

“How about myself and you race Lando and Sacha. First ones there win.”

This made Lando nod before Sacha moved to his side.

“Ok, race you.”

This made the boys sprint off, laughing as they made their way up the stairs. They were making sure that they didn’t run into anybody else because they would be told off and that wouldn’t be good.

Lando gave a grin as himself and Sacha made it to the dorm before quickly opening the door and racing in, using their card they were given at the start of the week. About two minutes later, George and Alex appeared, looking upset that they had been beaten by the other two.

* * *

P7- Marcus, Callum, Mike, Christian, Robert, Jüri, Jamie

Callum watched with amusement as Marcus struggled to pull the wetsuit up over his waist and to pull arms through it as well. He had already managed to get his own on, standing with his waterproof trousers pulled on as well. He hadn’t pulled on his waterproof jacket because he would overheat and that wasn’t good. They’d been told that yesterday as they were given the wetsuits, trousers, jackets and boots. He wanted to follow the rules and so had it lying on his bed, along with his boots. So he was just standing there in socks. They had also been told that it was advised they were wearing socks, ancient ones though. His attention was brought back to Marcus as he heard what sounded like a lot of effort.

“Do you need some help?”

He asked from where he was standing in the dorm room that himself, Marcus, Mick, Rob, Christian and Jüri were in, for the week of P7 camp.

“No, it's fine. I’ve got it”

Marcus continued to wiggle in his way into the wetsuit, grinning when he managed to get it up over his shoulders and got his arms into the sleeves as well.

“Would you mind helping me zip this up, I can’t reach the back.”

Callum gave a small nod as he walked over and zipped up the back, effectively sealing him in.

“Right, so I’ve seen you’ve managed to get into the wetsuit, You’ve now got to get the trousers and the wetsuit jackets on. Then we also have our boots. We’ve been told that we’ll get the lifejackets as we get our helmets and our kayaks.”

Mick said as he came out of the bathroom. They were the only three in the dorm room as Jüri, Christian and Rob had already made their way downstairs, but they had promised they would wait. Plus they had promised that they would sit with them on the minibus.

“Give me two seconds then.”

Marcus said as he quickly grabbed the waterproof trousers that he had laid out on his bed, pulling it over the wetsuit, before also pulling on his boots, along with Mick and Callum also trying theirs. They also all grabbed their jackets because they were only putting them on when they got outside.

“See you managed to get the wetsuit on then, Marcus. Let's go then. I don’t want to get into trouble for being late.”

Christian gave a small laugh when he spotted them as they walked down the stairs, all had their wetsuits, trousers and boots on, all also holding their jackets.

“Brilliant, let's go.”

Jüri gave another smile before the six-headed off, making their way outside and towards the kayak shed. The boys then started to pull their jackets over their heads as everyone else appeared to be doing the same.

“Alright, boys, ready to go?”

The boys spotted Jamie smiling at them as she pulled her hair up into a ponytail and making her way over to them.

“Yeah, looking forward to it.”

Callum gave another smile, Jamie was about to say something but was cut off by the instructor who waved his hand to get the attention of everyone gathered.

“Right. Glad to see everyone here. So the plan is, your going to get your lifejackets, and then your kayaks and paddles. We’re then going to get on the minibuses and have the kayaks on the trailers. Sound good? Let’s go.”

The group then proceeded to get their lifejackets, pulling them over their heads and clipping them into place around their chests. Callum then moved to get his kayak, sitting down in it, stretching his legs, giving the thumbs up, before he climbed out.

“Do you think there’ll be people who will fall into the sea?”

Jamie asked as she walked over to stand besides Callum as they watched the rest of the boys sitting into the kayaks and getting the thumbs up from the instructors.

“Right, that’s everyone. Let's go; there are two minibuses so we’ll be going into two groups. However, we will be waiting for everyone before we start. So there isn’t any need for a crush to get onto the minibuses.”

Of course, telling this to a bunch of 11 and 12 years was never that successfully, again being shown as all of the kids started to make a run for it. Marcus was grateful that he managed to get onto the minibus, the others following him.

“Do you want to come with us? As they said, we needed to be in pairs or threes?”

Marcus asked as they saw Jamie making her way up onto the minibus looking for a seat. She grinned when she heard Marcus and looked at all the boys.

“Really? You sure you guys won’t mind? I don’t want to be a bother.”

The boys all shook their heads; they liked Jamie. She was fun, and they liked hanging out with her at break and lunch. She was also smart, which was beneficial to them as they sometimes got told, they weren’t the smartest bunch at times. When she saw them nodding, she gave another smile before she made her way over to one of the single seats, sitting down and doing her seat belt as she wanted to fully make sure that she was allowed in this little group.

“ Ok brilliant, you ready to go guys?”

The kids turned to see the instructor climb up into the minibus and turning on the engine and starting the minibus up.

“Right so if one of you happens to fall into the water, you have got to grab onto your kayak even if you can’t pull yourself up onto it, just hold on. Then we’ll get somebody over to you, and helping you out. Understand?”

The instructor said before he carefully pushed himself into the water in the kayak, the rest following.

“Marcus, you’ll be ok, I promise. We were thinking we were going to connect some of the kayaks to our kayaks. You’ll still be able to paddle along, but you won’t drift.”

Marcus saw one of the instructors come over to him when she saw he was looking slightly worried and a little scared.

“Ok, you promise though that I’ll stay connected.”

He asked before he got a smile,

“I promise, trust me, you aren’t the first who is less confidence about this, you won’t be the last, and there isn’t anything wrong with this.”

This made Marcus give a small sigh and a smile clearly more relaxed as he pushed his kayak into the water, fixing his helmet on before he could see a few others making their way over as well.

“Didn’t expect to see you being one of the people to want to be pulled along.”

Marcus smiled when he saw Christian making his way over. Christian laughed as he pulled on his helmet and carefully clipping one of the tug ropes onto the front of the kayak.

“Didn’t want you to be on your own, and thought you could do with some company. Besides, the others are way more competitive than us. So I don’t mind at all.”

Marcus gave a small smile before he pulled Christian into a side hug before breaking apart.

“Right, you guys ready? Let’s go then, there’s eight of us in this group, so a good number.”

Marcus took a deep breath as he climbed into his kayak, which was now bobbing in the water, deep down, he knew it would be fine. He started to paddle as they began to move along as they were in the sea, he could see Christian who was in the kayak next to him, also very much connected. He again was starting to think that this wasn’t that bad.

* * *

P7- Arthur, Gianluca, Oscar and Fred

“Arthur, it's fine. Promise”

Gianluca rolled his eyes as he stood next to the bathroom door, in the dorm that the pair of them were sharing with Oscar and Fred. They had been lucky that they had been given one of the smaller dorms, but it was still a slight mess. Currently, Fred and Oscar were sitting on their bucks watching the door with almost hawk-like eyes.

“Arthur, you're making this way worse than it needs to be.”

Oscar said, stretching out his legs looking at his trainers that he was wearing.

“It is bad though; I look like a mess.”

Came the overdramatic voice that belonged to Arthur Leclerc, who had a unique talent for being quite possibly the most overdramatic 11 year old in the year.

“They told us to bring and wear old clothes because we’re going onto a dirt track. Everyone is wearing old stuff. All of us are wearing old stuff.”

Fred gave another sigh before the three could hear the door opening slightly, and Arthur poked his head out, whilst all the others looked at him with a smile.

“See you don’t look that bad, promise. I’m sure that there are going to be more people who looked bad. You still look ok.”

Gianluca gently squeezed Arthur’s shoulder, which seemed to calm Arthur down a little bit.

“You sure?”

He asked, before the others nodded, which seemed to further make Arthur feel better.

“Right we ready to go?”

Oscar gave another smile before he got up from his bed and grabbed his fleece jacket, throwing around his shoulders. The others all did the same, grabbing their rucksacks because they were told to bring them. The bags had general essentials such as water bottles and snacks, things that they needed for a 4-hour mountain bike-ride. The boys had initially been a little sceptical of the whole thing purely due to a large number of times Arthur had fallen off his bike. Thankfully he could now successfully ride the bike, and there was less of a chance of him falling off. The four managed to make their way to the rest of the group and successfully slotted themselves into the huddle, outside of the main bike shed.

“Right, let’s get you lot bikes and helmets. We want to get this down as fast as possible because we are going to be on the trails for a while.”

The boys joined the queue getting their bikes and helmets off the instructors, thankfully getting it done and dusted reasonably quickly, clipping their helmets on, thankfully avoiding a few whining from Arthur ‘Mr overdramatic’ Leclerc. He did hold the unofficial title of the biggest drama queen of P7, which he carried with a weird sense of pride. Gianluca, Oscar and Fred had taken Arthur under their wing at the start of P7, thinking that the new kid from Monaco would be fine. They hadn’t realized that the 11-year-old Monégasque was actually going to be a little nightmare to control. However, by the time they had figured this out, they had decided that they were too invested into their friendship with Arthur and it would be not only a shame but also pointless to stop being friends with him. Also, he had a really nice house, his mum was cool and so were his two older brothers. There was also the other positive that Arthur spoke French and was happy to teach the boys a few words here and there. Fred was teaching them Danish, and Gianluca was teaching them Portuguese. Oscar didn’t speak any other languages, but he wanted to be a good influence, so he was teaching them a few Aussie slang words.

“Ready to go, then?”

They could hear the instructor voice as they reached the start of one of the trails.

“How steep do you reckon this trail goes? Think it would be embarrassing if I pushed my bike up some of the worst bits?”

Fred asked, making the others look at him as they started to cycle, middle of the pack. They weren’t the slowest, but they weren’t the quickest.

“Isn’t Denmark quite flat?”

Gianluca asked, making Fred nod,

“Yeah, do you still think I could get away with it?”

The others all looked at him, deep in thought, before giving a nod.

“Yeah, but please try to get at least up somewhat up a hill before you admit defeat because you don’t want people to think a hill has destroyed you.”

Arthur said deeply serious before Fred gave another nod,

“Ok fine, I’ll try to get up at least one of the hills, but I’m warning you all before you give me the evils when I can’t get up a hill.”

Fred looked at all of the boys before they looked at him angelically.

“We promise that we won’t give you the evils, big promise.”

Gianluca gave a grin before Fred watched all of their faces, making sure that they were being serious. He then gave a sigh as he knew, he couldn’t work out if his lovely friends were being serious. Hopefully, they weren’t going to be mean about it; he trusted them enough.

“Ok, we are going to go up one of the steeper hills, try and get up as much of it as you can. Ideally, try to get to the top but don’t feel super defeated if you can’t fully reach the top. However we are going to wait for everyone to get up to the top, so don’t worry, we aren’t leaving you behind.”

The instructor said before making the way to the top of one of the hills, Fred silently cursing under his breath, in the most intimidating way that an 11 year could.

“Come on, Fred; let's get to the top, won’t race you promise.”

Arthur called before him, and Gianluca started to push on their peddles and make their way up, slowly disappearing as they made their way up the hill.

“Don’t worry, I won’t leave you, unlike those two.”

Oscar gave a small smile as he was peddling beside Fred, having slowed down to keep up with him. Fred was grateful that there was at least one of his friends who would be happy to stay beside him. He had managed to get up halfway up the hill, before giving a defeated sigh, slowly climbing off the bike. Oscar had also stopped but was still on his bike, having one of his feet on the ground, watching Fred.

“Do you want to carry on, on the bike? Or do you want to stop, and just push it up? I don’t think its that far to the top.”

Oscar asked before Fred looked back,

“Think I’m going to push it up the hill, but if you don’t have to get off your own bike. But thanks for sticking back.”

This made Oscar grin back, before he carefully pushed his foot back up on the peddle of the bike, still cycling but being careful to stay balanced on it.

“No worries, don’t want to lose you behind. Let's get going, especially if you're pushing that bike.”

He grinned again before pushing himself off, still remaining by Fred’s side but just going slightly quicker this time.

“Glad to see you made it up, still a bit of a shame that the first hill defeated you.”

Fred was greeted by the smiling faces of Arthur and Gianluca when he got to the top, just after Oscar.

“Brilliant, that’s everyone. Lets head-on.”

Fred gave a silent groan as he heard the instructor's way too perky voice as they set off again. Gosh, he hated steep hills.


	9. Quick update

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick update

Hell, everyone. Hope you're doing well,

no shot but instead just a thought that has been bugging me all week,

I don't want this to come across as sounding really needy but reading comments on work really helps me gauge if I should carry on writing something. Even if it's one comment or something like that. I have a few more things I'm writing for this and intend to post them. I love writing and it helps me switch off from all my uni work, but I sometimes need a form of validation and it often comes in the form of comments. I was really excited and ready to go when I read all of your comments after I posted the first few shots. Again, I don't want to come across as being needy or demanding, but instead as really grateful that you read this and leave positive comments. It really makes me feel that people enjoy my work, which gives me a little boost and makes me want to carry on. 

I hope that all of you don't mind me getting this off my chest, I've had a bit of a stressful week, and this has been playing on my mind for a little bit. 

Hope all of you understand and continue to enjoy this bunch of shots.

Thanks, everyone and much love,

Scottie Dog

xx


	10. Oscar and Daniel (featuring long flights, monkey bars and smashing one's face)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brief snippets of Oscar and Daniel’s relationship over the years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,  
> Hope you all are doing well. Just wanted to say a massive thank you from the bottom of my heart for all your lovely comments on the update I gave. I feel a lot better now and am very much looking forward to sharing the next few shots I have planned. I’m always open to suggestions, so if you have any, feel free to suggest them.  
> This shot came to me after scrolling through the internet as you do and finding all of the interactions between Daniel and Oscar. I thought it would be a good idea, and hence this shot was created. It takes some influence from my relationship with one of my best friends who was a school year ahead of me.  
> Quick clarification, smashing your face is basically hitting your face against something with quite a lot of force and hurting yourself. I’ve always used the word smashing or busted when either talking or writing stuff like this. Might have gotten me in trouble with a few English teachers over the years, for using informal language.  
> Also, the whole thing with the monkey bars is again based on another childhood event I had. A kid in P7 decided that it would be funny to try and show off in front of everyone, so swung back and forward upside down. Unfortunately, he did also smash his face into the side of the bars. However, he wasn’t that lucky and broke his nose. I was in P4 at the time, and it wasn’t the greatest thing to witness, probably why I can still remember it quite vividly after all these years.  
> Anyway, this is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you all enjoy,  
> Scottie Dog  
> xx

Oscar- P1 (aged 5), Daniel- P4 (aged 9)

Oscar had to begin with been with a little wary of Daniel Riccardo. When 5-year-old Oscar met 9-year old Dan for the first time, he had been slightly intimidated by the older kid. This was down to many thoughts and ideas that had been running through 5-year-old Oscar’s head, for the last 4 or 5 months.

The first thing which had started this off was when he’d been told back in Melbourne at the start of June, that he and his family were moving to Scotland, for his daddy’s work. His reaction had been very similar to that of other five-year-olds; he threw a few massive tantrums. That, of course, hadn’t worked, and he’d found himself in Melbourne airport on a 42-hour journey. The journey had also been made worse as he had almost lost Prema, Alpine and Renault a few times (his small collection of cuddly toys.) Thankfully he hadn’t, and now the Kangaroo, the Kola and the Platypus were sat at the end of his bed, in his new room. Thankfully once Oscar had settled, he was doing alright, he’d also made a few friends at school in the form of two boys Fred and Gianluca. The pair were also international, and that made Oscar feel considerably better, and he was finding his feet. That was also when he had become fully aware of Daniel Riccardo for the first time.

The nine-year-old had been playing on the monkey bars surrounded by his friends, showing off. It was likely that Oscar wouldn’t have seen this display, but himself and rest of P1 had been let into the big playground for break. Of course, they had gathered as part of the ground surrounding the monkey bars and Daniel. Oscar had been drawn to the bigger kid; the five-year-old had been watching with interest, the older boy pulling himself up and down on these bars. Unfortunately, Daniel hadn’t been that smart and had swung forward a little too far, and smacked his face against one of the sides of the monkey bars. Oscar had then seen Dan being dragged off to the nurse by a few of his friends. He was amazed by how much blood there was, and he figured that it was probably wasn’t that great for Daniel as he had been clutching his face in pain, as he was pulled along back into the main building.

“So, there was this P4 who hit his face against the monkey bars, and he messed up his face. Like there was a ton of blood and stuff.”

Oscar excitedly told his mummy as the pair made their way back to their house, after school. His mummy deep in thought, listening to what Oscar was saying.

“Oh hello Grace, how’s the troublemaker then? It seems he made quite an impact on some P1s then.”

She gave a smile when she saw their neighbour Grace standing at her front door, making her way into the house, a small boy ahead of her. The pair paused before turning around before Grace gave a smile.

“Fine thankfully, we were at A&E and Mr troublemaker here just needed a few stitches, and there’ll be a few bruises, but nothing is broken. Hello Oscar, I didn’t spot you there.”

Oscar knew that his mummy and daddy got on with their neighbours, the Riccardos, fellow Aussies. He also knew that they had two kids, Michelle and Daniel. It was only at this point that he was putting two and two together when he saw Daniel standing there with a grin, covered in a few bruises.

“Hello Mrs Riccardo, hi Daniel.”

Oscar gave a small smile and wave; he’d always been told that it was good to be polite to adults. Daniel also gave a grin, although it was clear it was a struggle.

“Hi Mrs Pistari, hi Oscar. I hope I didn’t traumatize you and your friends, from all that blood.”

“No, it's okay. We just wanted you to be okay. We asked Michael after he came back from the nurse and he said you were alright and that you’d gone to A&E.”

Oscar grinned which made Dan smile as well.

“Okay, that’s good to know. I promise that I won’t do it again and not to scare you. Mum said you’re from Melbourne. That’s cool, we only know people from Perth, like even Michael from Perth. I was disappointed when I found that out. But you're from somewhere else in Australia. Bet there is stuff that you do differently. I’ve been to Melbourne like once or twice. Mum’s got a friend who lives in Melbourne, but that doesn’t really count. I mean, I don’t know Mum’s friend that well.”

Dan started to talk again, smiling the whole time. Oscar didn’t know that about Michael. He had seen Dan and Michael hanging out a lot at school and knew Michael was from Australia.

“I’ve been to Perth like once or twice as well. How long have you lived here for?”

Oscar asked looking at Dan who grinned again,

“Um, myself and Michelle were both born in Perth, but we’ve moved when I was like six, so we’ve lived here for about three years.”

Dan smiled again before Grace gently squeezed Daniel’s shoulder,

“Lovely to talk to you two, but I have got to get this one inside and still sort out Dan’s face because his nose is still a little bit of a mess.”

That was the first meeting that Oscar had with Dan, but started to talk to him more after that. The pair often spoke over their garden fence, and they developed a close relationship. In fact, Oscar had learnt many interesting facts about Dan, one of which was that he wanted to own a honey badger and get lots of tattoos when he was older. So Oscar had given him a honey badger cuddly toy for his 10th birthday. Daniel had given him a massive hug when he opened it, and six-year-old Oscar had felt very proud of himself for coming up with that idea. Dan definitely treated Oscar like his younger brother.

Summer before S1 and S4

“So, you looking forward to S1?”

Oscar turned to see Daniel sitting on his desk, looking at Oscar with a curious look. Oscar had been hanging out with Daniel because his mum and dad had been busy and Grace had been happy to watch over Oscar for a bit. The pair had initially been outside, but because it was now raining, the pair were inside.

“I don’t know, like its different from primary school, there are more people, and everyone is so much older. It's fine right?”

Oscar asked looking at Daniel who gave a small nod, Daniel was now 15 and was in S3, so had been at the secondary school for a few years.

“Sometimes, you’ll have days where you don’t want to go in, and of course there are groups and cliques, some people aren’t nice, and some are. I guess it just depends who you surround yourself with. Most of the teachers are fine as well. Also, I’m taking that Gianluca, Fred and Arthur are also moving up with you as well.”

Dan sighed before pushing himself up, so he had his legs crossed on his desk, looking at Oscar.

“Yeah, it’s the four of us. Myself, Gianluca and Fred been friends since P1 and then Arthur has joined this year, but we became friends with him. He’s fun, and it works out quite well, because there is 4 of us now, rather than just three.”

Oscar smiled again, which made Dan lean over and playfully pushed his shoulder.

“If you stick with them, you’ll be fine. Promise, also, I’m going to be around, so I don’t mind if you want to talk to me at break or something. Not too embarrassed to be seen talking to a few S1s.”

Oscar laughed before Dan laughed again,

“Promise?”

“Promise”

* * *

Oscar, S1- (aged 13) Daniel, S4 (aged 16)

True to his word, Dan didn’t mind when Oscar sometimes came over to talk to him at break, he didn’t do it very often, understanding that he needed to figure out what he was doing without help from Dan all the time, and that was fine. It was a funny thing, secondary school and Oscar still wasn’t sure if he was going to fit in. Sure he had his friends, and they had also picked up a new one in the form of Logan Sargent. Another international, an American which added quite nicely to their little group and Oscar really liked Logan. Dan might have noticed this once or twice and gently teased him about it. Nothing ever hurtful, Oscar supposed that it was only fair seeing as he had teased Dan in the past over his various relationships.

The other thing that was beneficial about being friends with Daniel was that Dan had promised that he would give Oscar his old Nat 5 notes, he wasn’t looking forward to Nat 5s and exams, Dan said it wasn’t that bad. Still, Oscar knew he was lying, he could see it in his eyes whenever he talked about it, but he wasn’t going to bug Dan about it. In fact, Oscar was reasonably sure that Dan was fine about the whole thing.

That thought had stayed in his head for the whole course of the year, that was until it reached exam season as he knew it was called. He had been walking back from the local Sainsburys and seen Grace standing in the front garden looking stressed.

“Hello Mrs Riccardo, are you okay? You looked stressed, is something wrong?”

Oscar asked which caused Grace to sigh,

“Hello sweetheart, I thought I’d told you before, that’s it's alright to call me Grace. Daniel is just getting very stressed about his exams, and he’s upstairs. It was getting a little intense, so I came outside.”

She sounded stressed and maybe a little bit upset, which wasn’t good. Oscar liked Grace, she was fun, and he enjoyed talking to her.

“Can I go upstairs and talk to him?”

“If you want, I’ll warn you though; he’s a bit moody. I’ve tried to talk to him, and I haven’t been very successful in trying to get him out of his strop.”

Grace gave a soft smile before Oscar gave a nod with a smile,

“I’ll do that, but I need to drop these bags off in the kitchen. I’ll be back in two seconds.”

Oscar quickly ran off and opened his own front door, raced into the kitchen and dumped the bags in the kitchen, before racing out again and making her way over to the Riccardos.

“Okay, so you know where Dan’s room is.”

Grace smiled before Oscar nodded and raced up the stairs, gently knocking on the door,

“Hey Dan, it's just me. Your mum said you weren’t feeling great.”

Oscar then heard the door opening and seeing Dan standing in the door frame; he looked like he’d been crying.

“Hey, Osc, yeah just having a bit of an off day, I suppose. Do you want to come in? I don’t want to worry mum that much.”

Dan sighed before Oscar made his way into Dan’s room before Oscar opened his arms and Dan collapsed into his arms. Dan was a bit taller than Oscar, but that didn’t matter at this moment in time.

“Hey, its okay, exams don’t sound fun, bun your smart and I think you’ll be alright. Besides you have to make sure that you don’t cry or ruin your notes.”

This made Dan smile before carefully detaching himself from Oscar and making his way over to his desk, sitting down on the chair. Oscar proceeded to sit on the edge of Dan’s bed.

“Ah, yes the notes promise. Don’t worry; I haven’t made a mess of them.”

“You sure?”

“Very sure, won’t want to ruin the notes for my favourite S1.”

“I will willingly take that title. Plus if we’re totally honest, I would be distraught if I wasn’t.”

“Your too sweet Osc. What did I do to deserve you in my life? You sweet innocent S1. ”

Daniel grinned, pushing his knees up, so he had his elbows resting on them,

“Well, you busted your face. I witnessed it all and decided that I wanted to be friends with you. Also, your one to talk. Innocent? Dude, I’ve witnessed you making out with a few boys on multiple occasions. I’ve been mentally scarred by those scenes, besides I like hanging out with you. Plus I like your mum and dad as well.”

Oscar shrugged before Dan busted out laughing again, the light catching the small scar across his jaw, from all those years ago when he busted his face. Dan still was known as the P4 who smashed his face on the monkey bars, the ‘alumni’ basically consisting of the P1s to P7s who witnessed that day. Oscar did feel a little sorry for all the kids that hadn’t been at the primary school because they had no idea why Dan was called that.

“Well, that’s just a series of unfortunate timings. Anyway moving on, I also believe that you stated that another reason why you liked hanging out with me is because I tell you gossip from my year.”

“Exactly and you’re a good source of information.”

“Ah, I feel so loved right now. Well I mean you have beneficial information about S1.”

“The S1 stuff is never that interesting, not in the grand scheme of things anyway.”

“Doesn’t matter, gives me something to switch off to.”

Dan gave another smile, weaker than his normal ones, but he had perked up a lot more which was good. Oscar didn’t like seeing him upset or sad.

“Ah, Dan. You feeling better?”

The pair turned their heads to the nod on the door which was Grace,

“Yeah, feeling much better. Thanks, mum.”

“No worries, Oscar, I’ve just spoken to your mum. I asked her if it would be okay if you stayed over for dinner, and she said that was fine. Just if you wanted to. You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

Grace said from the other side of the door.

“No, I would be really happy to stay over, only as long as I’m not being a nuance.”

“Of course not, anyway dinner should be done in about 20 minutes. Besides, I think Dan could use the company.

* * *

Oscar- S4 (aged 16), Daniel- Uni (aged 18)

“So, this is it then, Osc. I’m going to miss you, you know.”

Oscar gave a small sigh as himself and Dan stood in the Riccardos' front garden. All of Daniel’s stuff for Uni were in the two suitcases shoved in the back of Joe’s car. They had decided that it was better for Dan to fly down to Liverpool, he also was heading down with Grace to help him settle in, before she flew back up. There had been a big leaving party at the Riccardos, and Oscar had been invited along with his family. It had also been the first time that Oscar had met Dan’s friends other than Michael, who knew quite well. This has also been when he had met Max, Daniel’s boyfriend for the first time. Oscar had known about Max because he was in Arthur’s brother Charles’ year. Oscar also was very aware he was one of the much younger ones at the leaving party, but Dan didn’t seem to ignore him and carried on including him.

“I’m going to miss you as well. Keep in touch though; I don’t want our WhatsApp going dead just because you’re making new uni friends.”

Oscar grinned before Dan gave another smile,

“Course not, trust me, that WhatsApp chat isn’t going dead at all. You’ll be sick of seeing messages from me.”

“Doubt that. Could you tell me everything? Essential stuff.”

“Will do Osc.”

“Ready to go, Dan?”

The pair turned to see Grace and Joe standing by the car, watching the two’s exchange.

Rather than talking, Dan pulled Oscar into a tight hug, standing for a few seconds before they broke apart. Oscar then waved as he watched the car driving off.

_WhatsApp-_

_Oscar: You all there safely?_

_Dan: Yeah, all good. Missing you already._

_Oscar: Missing you as well._

* * *

Bonus- The great monkey bars face-smashing incident

“You know you don’t have to show off by hanging upside down on the monkey bars.”

Michael said as he walked besides Daniel as the pair made their way towards the big playground, Michael tugging on his coat watching him. Dan was grateful that he had Michael as a best friend; he was definitely the smarter one of the two.

“I know that, but I have to stake my claim and make my name known amongst the new younger years. Any way I can hang upside down on the monkey bars fine. Let’s go, come on.”

Dan grinned again before tugging Michael along by his coat-sleeve, which made Michael sigh and give a smile.

“Fine but it's your own fault if something goes wrong.”

“Ah, my lovely friend. What would I do without you?”

“You’d probably have ended up in A&E multiple times.”

“What’s an example of that?”

“When you broke your arm in P2 by falling off your bike. You had ridden ahead of me, going way too fast and you lost control of the bike and flipped over.”

Michael rolled his eyes before Dan pushed his shoulder.

“Yeah and that hasn’t happened again. Anyway look the monkey bars are free.”

Dan raced over before carefully swinging himself up and along. At this point, a small crowd had gathered watching him. Michael keeping an eye on him, praying that something stupid didn’t happen. Unfortunately, because it was Daniel Riccardo, disaster was never far away, and this time was no different. Dan was swinging back and forward building speed quickly. However, he miss judged this and went flying forward straight into one of the sides of the wooden sides, creating a cracking sound. This, of course, caused everyone to wince in pain, before Dan slowly broke away and carefully got to his feet before Michael raced over, looking over his face. It wasn’t a pretty sight.

“Come on. Let's get you to the nurse.”


	11. Pierre and Esteban, Nat 5 French, some arguments and a truce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is something between Pierre and Esteban, and nobody knows why. There’s also tension created from a Nat 5 French class and a truce also made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,  
> Hope you are well, sorry for being missing for a bit. Uni work and some other stuff has taken up a lot of my time. So this is a little shot surrounding Pierre and Esteban, and a little creativity about why they don’t like each other. There’s a bit more angst in this one than normal. Also, I'm not trying to stereotype anybody from France in the slightest. It's just the idea fits quite well in this shot.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Hope you all enjoy  
> Much Love  
> ScottieDog  
> xx

It was a well-known fact that Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon didn’t like each other, hated each other in reality. The issue was that nobody knew why, it was an impossible rabbit hole, and it had plagued their year and quite possibly the whole school. This school had a terrible habit of latching onto any drama that appeared; it was a big mess. Ideally, it would have been best if the pair hadn’t been in any classes together. That thankfully was how Nat 5s and Highers had gone. However this year, no such luck, AH French, quite possibly the worst subject for them to be in a class together. Everyone was surprised that they had managed to get this far without there having been a murder or either one of them ending up in the hospital with some sort of serious injury. It had even gotten to the point that Lance, Esteban’s boyfriend, had asked George in form on one Monday morning, what the hell he should do. Lance had only joined for Highers so had only witnessed two years of this feud. George had been here since the beginning; the response had been,

“Trust me mate; this has been going on for the last four years, including this one. Not a single person has any sort of clue what the hell this is about. Then its been going on since they were about 11 or 12, well that’s what we gathered.”

“Oh, so it's like one of those childhood feuds that has developed into some deep-set hate for each other?”

“Could be. The only snippets that we know are that they were at school together back in France, were close until they were about 13. They both moved over for Nat 5, aged 14. Took one look at each other, and their eyes were basically screaming murder, and there was some angry yelling in French. I mean if anything, you are one of those people who have a shot at solving this mystery.”

“Oh, how come?”

“Your dating one of them, and you speak French.”

“Esteban claims that my French isn’t the entire thing because I speak Canadian French and proper French is from actual France.”

Lance gave a smile; this was true. Esteban had been delighted when he discovered that Lance spoke fluent French, only to be replaced with a tiny bit of disappointment when he learnt that it was Canadian French but had let it slide because he still wanted to be in a relationship with Lance. Apparently, it was one of the few things that Esteban and Pierre had in common, as Pierre was also critical of Charles’ French as well. Despite being in a relationship for three years, Pierre was still petty in the uniquely French way about his boyfriend's Monaco French. This was also the case with Nicky, George’s boyfriend who also was fluent in Canadian French, both Esteban and Pierre had again been uniquely horrified when they figured out that George was with Nicky. Even more still when they discovered that Nicky was teaching George French (Pierre had felt some weird level of betrayal and didn’t talk to George for a week.) 

“Yeah, but there are enough similarities, I suppose. I don’t want to sound like I’m being mean about your boyfriend, but he’s just being ‘French’, oh god that sounds like I’m basically stereotyping him.”

George gave a sheepish smile which made Lance laugh again,

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I tell him all the time that he’s being ‘French’, especially after he criticizes my French as he again claims that I say some words ‘wrong.’ Besides he says everyone has been calling him and Pierre ‘French’ for years, and they have accepted it and just of roll with it.”

  
“Oh, so they do talk in AH French then. That puts one tick to this web of mysteries then.”  
“Well I wouldn’t call it talking, more they’ve stopped insulting each other, and will say at least one or two non-passive-aggressive words at each other. They still death stare at each other all the time. I mean we all know that fact anyway.”

  
“That’s a good thing, I guess then. Trust me mate; this whole school will be forever grateful if you manage to crack the case. I think Charles has given up at this point.”

  
They were going to carry on their conversation, but Wolff had come in, effectively ending their conversation. It did stay in Lance’s head all day though, wondering what had really gone on back in France. Sure he still had a few loose ends of things back in Montreal that he had left without sorting. However, they were things that were staying back in Canada, Esteban and Pierre’s thing? That seemed to have defiantly come overseas, and it also seemed like it was something that they wanted to keep hidden and between themselves.

* * *

_14 years ago- Nursey in France, First meeting_

_“Ah, Pierre, brilliant. I’m going to pair up you with Esteban.”_

_Pierre nodded as the teacher gently smiled, pointing to another boy who was standing in the classroom, looking confused._

_“Hi, I’m Pierre.”_

_Pierre gave a small smile as he made his way over to Esteban who looked up and gave a smile,_

_“Hi, I’m Esteban. I like your t-shirt.”_

_“Thanks, I like yours as well.”_

_Pierre gave another smile, quite proud of himself that he had chosen a good outfit for his first day of nursery._

_“Do you want to hang out and go and play on the swings at break?”_

_Esteban laughed which made Pierre nod,_

_“Ok, that sounds fun.”_

_“Let's be friends.”_

_Pierre grinned as the pair made their way to the swings,_

_“That sounds fun; I’d be your friend.”_

_Esteban smiled again._

* * *

Present-day-

“So remind me again why we have to deal with Gasly and Ocon again?”

Logan sighed himself and Arthur made their way to their Nat5 French class, Arthur slowly rolling his eyes, as he pulled at the straps on his bag,

“I don’t know; all Vergne told us last lesson was that we are having a few lessons from the AH students because the language department thought it was a good idea and I’m convinced there are a few teachers at the point of certain death. Also, there is a rumour Vergne might have slightly overboard with the wedding planning. I mean are we surprised though?”

“I’ve never seen him more excited about anything else before, well nothing whilst he’s been teaching us. He does get excited if his classes do well with their exam results. Quick question though, if the older ones are teaching us, why is it, the AH ones?”

Logan asked again before Arthur looked at him again,

“This is only going off from what Pierre said, but he said it was because the AH students were viewed as being more capable compared to the H students. I did see the visible relief from him when I told him that I was in the Nat 5 French class, he was being given. What? It's good to be friends with your older brother’s boyfriend. Besides they aren’t that much older than us. Also, Pierre’s smart and helps me with my homework sometimes. He’s gotten a place at St Andrews for law; you need to be smart to get into that uni.”

“That is true; I do suppose it is a good thing, means we don’t have to listen to Vergne talking about the wedding again. How long did he spend talking about it last lesson?”

“Um, I think it was about a solid 20 minutes.”

Arthur laughed as he opened the door into their classroom, followed by Logan. The pair gave a small smile when they saw Pierre bent down looking at his laptop, before peering up and smiling when he saw Logan and Arthur.

“Hello, you two. Ready to go? I promise that myself and Esteban won’t try to let our personal beef get in between us for these next few lessons.”

Pierre gave a smile before he gave a sigh when he had found the thing he was looking for on his laptop.

“He looks like he’s slightly dreading it.”

Logan whispered to Arthur, who gave a small nod as they sat down.

“Yeah, he might have been worrying about it when he came over.”

“Pierre sure spends a lot of time at yours.”

“Yeah, not complaining though, he’s fun.”

Arthur whispered again trying to be discreet, which impressed Logan, the pair watching Pierre before they saw Esteban walking in, sighing as he dropped his bag and fixed Pierre with a look when he saw Pierre’s PowerPoint,

“I thought we were going to use mine, Gasly.”

“Yeah, but when I tried to access your link you sent me, it didn’t work. So I decided to use mine, Ocon.”

Pierre gave a hiss watching Esteban carefully,

“You know this is reminding me of the scene from mean girls.”

Arthur whispered again, before Logan looked at him again, not looking surprised in the slightest.

“Wait, do you mean the one in the cafeteria with the line of, ‘I know how this would be settled in the animal world.’”

“I didn’t expect you to know that one.”

“Dude, the number of times that the five of us have watched mean girls when we’ve been over to yours. I’m fairly certain that I could quote the whole movie.”

“See I told you it was a good idea.”

The pair carried on muttering whilst also watching Esteban and Pierre looking like there was the increasing possibility of bursting into a full-on war.

“Right, ok so Esteban and I are going to be teaching you for the next few weeks.”

Pierre gave a small smile as the pair looked at the whole of the class.

* * *

_Two years ago- Secondary school in Scotland,_

_“Hey, you alright? You seem a little off.”_

_Pierre turned his head to see Alex sitting next to him in form, looking a little concerned. Pierre gave a small sigh which made Alex squeeze his hand, before giving a small smile,_

_“It's about Esteban, isn’t it? It’s the fact that Lance and himself are now a couple. Pierre, you know this isn’t healthy, whatever this is about.”_

_“It's fine; honestly, Alex, I’m happy that he has managed to find somebody. They really care about each other, and I suppose that’s good.”_

_Alex was thinking about pushing for an answer, but Horner came in, halting their conversation. Pierre looking strangely thankful that the conversation topic had been dropped._

* * *

Present-day-

“So any luck with figuring out what the hell is going on as of recently? That Nat 5 French class sounded like a nightmare. Oscar told me that Logan and Arthur were a little traumatized from it all. I only gathered some things were said, and it led to some bad memories for both of them.”

Christian asked as the chaos squad, Juan, Giuliano and Guanyu were gathered at their local spot in the playground. He also was looking straight at Giuliano who was French and therefore was seen as a useful resource because god love them; none of the others could speak French. There was a variety of languages in the group, Danish, Chinese, Russian, Estonian, Spanish and German. However, they weren’t useful at the moment because their main interest was on the two French S6s and the whole issues surrounding the outburst in the Nat 5 French class and the almost strangling. 

“Unfortunately I haven’t, its mostly just yelling and they don’t seem to talk to each other otherwise. There’s only so much you can get from corridor gossip.”

Giuliano sighed before the others nodded, falling into silence before they heard footsteps and looked up. They were surprised to see Pierre running across the ground looking like he’d been crying, there was also a few figures running after him. The confused S5s then watched as the figure of Alex came into view and carefully took his hand before Pierre collapsed in his chest. The two then proceed to make their way back inside.

“What the hell was that?”

Marcus whispered, the rest equally looking as stunned.

* * *

_A few months ago, the Christmas holidays, George’s house._

_“Look I’m sorry about what I said. I shouldn’t have said it.”_

_George looked confused as he heard voices shouting in the hallway before he felt Nicky’s arms wrapping around his waist._

_“Can you hear those voices?”_

_He asked before Nicky nodded,_

_“Wait, I think that’s Pierre and Esteban. They sound upset; I think it would be a smart idea to find Lance and Charles.”_

_Nicky said before carefully dropping his arms around George’s waist and making his way upstairs. George also proceeded to go and find Lance and Charles, who were standing in the huddles in the living room._

_“Hey, I don’t want to be a pain, but I think some stuff is about to go down with Pierre and Esteban.”_

_George was quick to clock onto the concerned looks on the other two lads’ faces. Wordlessly they nodded and proceeded to follow George up the stairs where Nicky already was standing desperately trying to calm the two down._

_“I’m happy for you Ocon, I truly am.”_

_“Well if you are, you never said it. Honestly and the fact I was naive enough to think we could have become a couple.”_

_“I thought the exact same thing, I thought you truly did care about me, I guess I was wrong.”_

_“I did care, well until you told me you were moving with minimal warning.”_

_“I did tell you about that. You were the first person I told, outside of my family.”_

_“You know what? I’m sick of all of this Gasly. We had our moment, and we lost it, and there is no point in trying to reconcile. So I’m done with this all.”_

_“Thinking about this, your right for once Ocon. I’m done as well.”_

_With this, the pair separated walking over to the three standing at the top of the stairs, and both took their boyfriend’s hand and headed down the stairs._

_“Well, that was intense. Did you pick up anything from that all?”_

_George asked before he held onto Nicky’s hand, looking up at his boyfriend, who also looked confused._

_“Unfortunately not. They were just shouting at each other about something that has happened between the two of them. I don’t think we are going to figure that out.”_

_Nicky sighed softly holding onto George’s hand before the pair made their way down the stairs._

* * *

Present-day-

“I heard about the meltdown in Nat 5 French and the fact that both Pierre and Esteban ended up going home. Did Charles and Lance end up going home with them as well?”

Lando asked from where he was curled up into Sacha on one of the sofas in the sixth form comm.

“Yeah, both of them did, Williams thought it was best after it all. She even gave the thumbs up for Lance and Charles as well. I also think that all the teachers are now starting to figure out that this is a lot worse than everyone originally thought.”

Alex sighed where he was sitting next to Lando and Sacha with Lily’s head on his lap,

“I really hope that we figure this out and hopefully we can heal some cracks.”

Lily gave a small smile which made the others nod sadly.

* * *

“So I feel like I owe you an apology.”

Pierre and Esteban both stared at each other in the corridor the following day.

“I’m sorry for all the stuff I’ve said in the past few months. Can we at least bury it for now?”

Pierre asked carefully holding his hand, which made Esetban sigh before taking it and shaking it.

“Ok, I also apology for the stuff I’ve said as well. Sure we can call a truce, need to make sure that Abiteboul doesn’t put us into a group to teach some younger kids.”

“Agree, I think Arthur and the rest of his Nat 5 class are trying to tell Vergne that it was a bad idea to get both of us to teach them. There’s some talk about splitting us or putting us into different groups for the teaching. I suppose it’s a positive that the kids thought we were good teachers apart from the slight fight.”

“Oh, yeah I forgot that Arthur is Charles’ younger brother. I suppose I’ll see you later then.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you later then.”

Pierre gave a small smile before Esteban gave a small laugh as they dropped hands and proceed to go their sperate ways, unaware of the small group that had gathered. All were looking extremely confused. That was the thing though, there never was a straight forward answer in this place, and it seemed like the whole Gasly and Ocon deal would just be a cold case, waiting to be cracked when one was willing to talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you all enjoyed, feel free to comment if you think I should write a part 2.  
> Thanks, everyone  
> ScottieDog  
> xx


	12. Mention of mocks, winter wonderland and teachers dating rumours

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jüri has a meltdown about mocks, the rest of the group cause some chaos at winter wonderland, and there is more proof for the Vettel and Hamilton dating rumour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,   
> Second shot, this one is a lot lighter and more fun. Due to COVID, the winter wonderland up in town, where I live isn’t taking place, and I’m sort of sad about that, (even if it’s a bit tacky), its always been a massive part of my childhood, so I decided to write about it with our lovely group of S5s. Also, the £5 bet and potato on the stick are real, based on my friends and my experiences from the last few years. We also saw two of our teachers on the ice rink as well, (They had just gotten married in the summer, and it was quite cute seeing them)  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should remain on AO3.  
> Hope you all enjoy,  
> Much love   
> ScottieDog  
> xx

It was a well-accepted fact that nobody liked mocks, and Jüri was one of the S5s who liked to make this know. Yet again, he was complaining about the unjustness of it all not only to the original chaos squad but also Juan, Giuliano and Guanyu. Giuliano and Guanyu had both joined at the start of the year, and the pair had been roped into the group, where they were happy enough.

“Well at least, one positive off this whole thing is that you don’t have to include your SQA number. I mean that has taken me ages to learn.”

Christian sighed from his spot on the wall where the group had gathered, making Jüri look at him in the sense of amazement,

“You actually learnt your number? I only have one question for you. Why?”

“Because I got way too stressed about Nat5 results over the summer and thought the perfect way to distract myself was worry about it was to learn the number, and I can proudly say I have.”

“Showing us up all there Christian.”

Juan gave a small laugh before Giuliano and Guanyu looked confused before Callum noticed it and gave a small tired sigh,

“SQA gives you a number, that is basically the way that they track you. The minute you enter exam years, you get an account, so myself and these lovely lads already have all of ours. You two are bound to have numbers; the only question is where you’d find it though.”

“I think the sixth form office have all the numbers for sixth form. I’m sure you could go and ask for it at break or lunch at some point.”

Robert gave a small smile which made the rest of the group sigh in relief, glad that somebody in this group knew important information like this.

“Right, so I like said earlier, mocks aren’t fun.”

Jüri gave another sigh, making the point very clear that he wasn’t happy with the prospect of having to sit exams,

“Has he always been like this, when it comes to exams?”

Guanyu asked looking a little worried before there was a nod from Mick,

“Yep. Last year was worse. Much worse. Just be thankful that you weren’t around for that. Also, another thing, do you have any idea what that year group assembly was about, earlier?”

Mick asked looking a little confused before Rob swung his arm around his boyfriend’s shoulders,

“You didn’t miss much; it was just about the S6 ball at the start of December and how the fact that Williams doesn’t want anybody showing themselves up and that there will be consequences if anybody turns up drunk or something similar.”

This made all of the boys sigh again, sure the S6s were having their ball and making a way too big deal about it, but then again they would probably be the same next year.

“Anyway, more importantly, are you guys still up for Winter Wonderland, next weekend. I saw them putting the rides up in town on the way to school this morning. Then there’s also the Christmas market as well. Your totally welcome to come along if you want, Guanyu and Giuliano, I’d just say you need to make sure you wrap up because it gets cold quick.”

Callum smiled before Marcus nodded again,

“Yeah, it’s a little corny but its so much fun. Who was it that threw up last year after that ride? Oh, wait, yeah it was Jüri. Also, it’s an opportunity to listen to Mick complaining about the German Christmas market; he does it every single year.”

“What? I’m German, and I’m allowed to make comments on it, its nothing like the real thing which is a massive let down. I mean, I was hopeful when we went the first time, and I was greatly disappointed. Anyway, back to the matter at hand.”

Mick gave them all a look,

“So what is the main matter then?”

Juan asked as they heard the bell go signalling that unfortunately lunch was over and they had to go to lessons, something that nobody liked.

* * *

“Hey, so how you feeling about the whole concept of mocks? It’s like last year all over again, only worse, even if it is fewer subjects. Also, how are your significant others finding this all?”

Callum was greeted by Jamie sighing as she slid herself into her seat in between Mick and himself, in their business class.

“I’m dating Marcus; it wouldn’t be him not to have a meltdown about this all. It hasn’t hit him yet. How’s Tati finding it all?”

He asked before Jamie gave a small smile, before pulling out her laptop,

“Quite well actually, I think she’s finding it better with just five. How’s Rob doing?”

This made Mick laugh making the other two laugh as well,

“Its Rob, he’s doing well. Anyway, more importantly, are you still up for the great karting championship. I’m amazed at how many people have signed up for it. It's going to be fun though and its for a good cause.”

This also was one of the traditions within this school, but the fun type of tradition. The charity prefects a few years ago had managed to rent out a kart track, and there was racing. It had made a decent amount of money, and people enjoyed it. So it had been running for the last few years and this year was no different.

“Oh 100%, myself and Tati are a key component of our team, and we are going to win. I mean we need to redeem ourselves after last year’s disaster.”

This caused the three to shudder, yes they weren’t going to mention that. Their karting team had been unlucky last year, and they weren’t going to allow that to happen again. Their team basically was the three of them, Tatiana, Marcus and Rob. Unfortunately, it seemed that there was a limit of six, so the others had created their own team. That team has been Jüri, Christian and Juan. However now they had pulled in Giuliano and Guanyu. The two teams were more focused on beating the teams in S6, and the teams made up of teachers. So they were quite civil to each other.

“So I also heard that some of the teachers might be getting involved as well. Just a rumour though, both the Wolffs, Williams, Vettel and Hamilton. Dream team right there.”

Mick gave a whisper again, making the other two look at him with amazement. However before they could question it further, Wolff walked into the class before explaining,

“Right so I have heard some rumours flying around about if I am taking part in the annual karting championship. I am, and my team and I are going to declared victorious.”

* * *

“Welcome my friends to Winter Wonderland, who cares that it's only the middle of November? I’ve also made a bet with Juan that Jüri is going to be sick again.”

Christian gave a smile as the group had gathered near the train station as quite a few of them had come in on the train. In fact, Callum, Christian and Mick were the only three who lived central enough. Even then, both Callum and Mick still needed to get the bus. They were also a little jealous of Christian who could just walk. It also happened that the rides and the market were also only a short walk from the train station and they all had agreed that this was the best place to meet.

“So how much did you and Juan bet then?”

Robert asked as he pulled his beanie out of his bag before pulling it on and pulling his bag back on.

“£5, I’m saying that Jüri is going to be sick and Christian is forever optimistic, says that he isn’t going to be sick. Also, don’t tell him about this bet. We don’t want him to be influenced. Oh, there he is. Hey Jüri, over here.”

Juan laughed as the group saw the mentioned Estonian making his way over to them,

“Sorry guys, my train got delayed, and you know what the rail network is like. Scot rail at its finest. Anyway, the important thing is I’m here. Ready to go?”

Jüri gave a smile before slotting himself into the rest of the group and getting a few playful shoves as they made their way towards the rides and the market stalls. In fairness to him, he did live in what could be described as the middle of nowhere; it was lucky that the rail network even went out that far. Even then the trains were always a bit late, and it wasn’t the best, better than nothing though.

“So we are we getting Christian to pay for tickets again.”

Juan asked before they heard the similar sigh from Christian who pulled out his wallet before Marcus turned to the two looking vaguely confused,

“Christian, Callum and Mick live central enough that they can get a discount for tickets with their postcodes. We’ve been making them pay since we figured this out. The rule is though that we pay for our own food and anything else that we buy from the markets.”

This seemed to clear this up as the six got towards the ticket stall before Christian turned to face them all,

“Right which rides are we doing this year? Also, we’re letting Giuliano and Guanyu choose first because they haven’t experienced this before.”

Christian death stared down the others when they looked like they were about to comment, thankfully they didn’t make any sort of comment about this and Christian gave a small nod in thanks before he turned back to the other two lads, who had been looking at the sign with all the rides and prices.

“Um, can I go with the roller coaster?”

Giuliano asked before getting a nod from the rest of the group before they turned to Guanyu,

“Bumper cars?”

“Good choice lads but just to let you know Marcus here is a slight terror on the bumper cars. You don’t want to get in his way. Right we’ve sorted out the two of you. Also, everyone cool to go with last year's choices?”

Christian asked before getting another set of nods,

“Brilliant, so we’ve all sorted. Right, I’ll be a few minutes.”

The group then watched as Christian made his way over to the stand, watching him in the queue, before giving the thumbs up as he came back with a handful of tickets.

“Right lads, we ready to go then?”

He asked before making sure that everyone was present and correct because he sure as hell wasn’t losing anyone, especially when he had spent his own money on tickets.

* * *

“Right, so we told you to be aware of Marcus on the bumper cars. Anyway, want to go get food?

Callum smiled as he zipped up his coat before swung his arm around Marcus, who was grinning, clearly pleased that he had managed to uphold his title of the bumper car master. It also was good practice for the future school karting championship which was coming up in the next few weeks.

“Yeah, sounds good. There’s a stall where they do a potato on a stick. It's honestly amazing. Even Mr. critic here agrees that they are good. Right, Mick?”

Mick playfully rolled his eyes before giving a smile,

“I will give you that one Callum. They are good. Let’s go then boys. Also, we need to stay in a tight group because it gets busy and we don’t want to lose anyone. It’s happened before, and we spent 10 minutes trying to find Rob after we lost him. Honestly, we were expecting it to be Marcus or Jüri. Rob’s one of the smart ones in this group.”

This made the group laugh whilst Rob rolled his eyes,

“In my defence, I ended up talking to a Russian tourist who was lost and asked me for directions. Ended up talking in Russian for a bit, turned around and had been left.”

Rob playfully groaned, clearly having annoyed memories about the whole experience.

“Let's go then because I don’t want them to run out of potatoes because I’m starving.”

“Marcus, they aren’t going to run out. I’m sure that they have plenty of them. Also, they have to have tons because they are trying to sell as many as they to make a profit.”

Rob gave another sigh looking at Marcus who was looking deadly serious about this fact, which hardly surprised the boys, they had after all been dealing with this since they were children just old enough to understand what being friends meant. Juan had been dealing with the chaos since S1 so a good four years by this point. Giuliano and Guanyu? A few months, two or three at tops, but the thing was they were sticking around and being let into an upstanding tradition? That was a level of trust they weren’t going to betray, and they liked being in this mess.

“Onwards let's go.”

Marcus called again, the rest following him.

* * *

“I feel like we should be more worried about if he’s got burns rather than the cost of those gloves.”

Guanyu asked looking a little worried before Jüri hissed again,

“No, don’t worry; it's only a small amount, its fine and the gloves were £6.50 from Trespass, so it's fine. I mean North Face were charging £8.99 for what basically are the same gloves. Unbelievable.”

Apart from that one tiny hiccup, and thankfully Jüri not getting any degree of burns, the whole thing went smoothly without anyone being sick or getting seriously injured. In fact, Juan was true to his word and gave Christian the £5. This had mock horrified Jüri, but he hadn’t made any comment on it. They also ran into Jamie and Tati in the queue for the ice rink and had agreed to hang out on the rink skating. The two girls laughing as they were skating ahead, the boys following them, trying to catch with them, laughing as Callum caught up with Jamie, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. Jamie playfully whacking him after she managed to wiggle free. It was fun, the group of them spinning around as fast as they could, before Tatiana froze, signalling to the small gathering to where she was, at the side of the rink.

“Look, see I told you they’re a thing.”

She gave a small smile and pointed towards two figures.

“Would we be terrible people if we went over there are broke their happy little bubble?”

Marcus asked which of course led to everyone looking at him,

“Yes, it would be. Let's give them this moment. I mean the amount of stuff that put up with, they’ve earnt this.”

Mick looked at Marcus before the gaggle of teenagers watched as Mr Vettel and Mr Hamilton skated past them,

“We’ve told you that we ran into the pair of them walking Roscoe when we were walking Poppy. It's cute; I’m now waiting for them to admit that they’re dating.”

Callum whispered again, the rest deep in thought contemplating this idea. It would be cute if they were a couple, teaching power couple without a shadow of a doubt. Everyone in the whole school wanted the two to be a couple, and Mick, Callum and Robert might have dropped one or two hints at Vettel in form. They shouldn’t really be doing it, but then again they hadn’t been told off yet, so of course, they were going to carry on with it.

“I can feel like they might be looking towards us, right, let's look we’ve having a conversation.”

Christian hissed making the teenagers turning their heads, so they were just facing each other, cutting out the rest of the world.

“Hello, guys, it's nice to see you all.”

The group turned their heads when they heard Vettel’s voice; he looked happy tightly holding onto Hamilton’s hand who also looked happy.

“Hello Mr Vettel, it's nice to see you as well.”

Guanyu nodded, taking his turn as being the smart one in the group. They talked for a few minutes before the two teachers skated off.

“They are like 100% a thing. Anyway, we were going to get candy floss before we headed off. Want to join us, lads?”

Tatiana asked, holding onto Jamie’s hand, before the group got off the rink and headed off, their arms swung around each other, laughing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you all enjoyed,  
> Let me know if you want to see the great Karting championship. I felt like I should include something to do with racing. I have a few ideas planned for it already.   
> ScottieDog   
> xx


	13. Nativity? We're done for and too much glitter.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why did the Upper 6s agree to this, running this whole nativity? It's going to be a nightmare. Including a large number of angels, Charles in a wig, a set that might fall apart and way too much glitter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone,  
> Hope all of you are doing well, so Christmas is nearing and I’ve decided to write something Christmas related because why not? So I’ve decided to write our lovely upper 5s, and sixth form doing a school nativity.   
> The nativity is the story of the birth of Jesus and it’s a massive part of British culture. I’ve been part of many nativities during primary school, the highlight was being a angel in primary 2. I’ve taken some creativity liberties as I haven’t done any in secondary school but I thought it would be fun. Also featuring tired sixth form head Claire because we love a good bit of confused and tired Claire.  
> This is a work of fiction, separate from real life and should stay on AO3.  
> Thanks and much love   
> Scottie Dog   
> Xx

“So remind me why we agreed to do this?”

Alex asked as he observed George pull a wig onto Charles’ head before wrapping a blue piece of blue material around the wig. Both him and George were already in costume, so it looked a little strange watching George fixing the long brown wig onto Charles’ head.

“Because it’s a school tradition and Charlie here agreed to be Mary, even if we had the girls and yet Charlotte decided that she was going to take the role of Gabriel, head angel and her crew of angels, and we got given this part of the story.”

George replied whilst he got handed a bunch of bobby pins from a confused looking Max who was sitting on one of the chairs watching the whole thing with a sense of amazement.

“Also Charles is the only one of us who would willingly wear a dress, and we’d given each other roles anyway, and after we lost Charlotte and the rest of the girls, Charles was given the role of Mary.”

Lando replied from where he was sat next to Sacha whilst Sacha was fixing Lando’s robe.

“So speaking of roles, Charles is Mary, I’m Joseph, Lando, Alex and George are the three wise men, and then Sacha and Max are helping out backstage.”

Pierre asked getting words of agreements.

“Yeah and we’re just forcing the younger ones to do our evil biddings, aka all the boring roles.”

Lando replied it was true, being the Upper 6s meant that they were allowed to take the main roles in the school’s traditional student-run nativity. Originally the plan had been to get Lando to be the baby Jesus, but they had quickly figured out that was a bad idea and decided that using one of Lando’s sisters’ baby dolls was a better choice. Besides he had been baby Jesus back in the nursery at the age of 3, because he’d been a tiny toddler, now he’d agreed to be a wise man because he still wanted to get involved.

“Besides we have a ton of the Upper 5s being shepherds, I swear I have never seen so many dressing gowns.”

George said as he smiled as he pinned the last bobby pin and carefully getting up from the chair, he’d been sat in and stepping back allowing Charles to stand up, whilst the rest carried on fussing around him, carefully making sure the dress fitted. It hung right on his frame, as they had bought a blue dress which was a bit bigger and had to get it altered.

“Right, so I managed to get the pumps, I’m just now hoping that they fit your feet, Charles.”

The boys turned their heads to see Charlotte making her way into the classroom that they had turned into one of the dressing rooms. She was wearing a simple white shirt, a white tutu, some sliver leggings, trainers with sparkly laces, sparkly wings, a halo headband, her hair in plaits and a ton of glittery makeup and actual glitter. She also had a pair of simple black pumps in her hands which she passed over to Charles, who carefully started to pull them on, being careful not to slip on the end of the dress.

“I like your outfit, didn’t see you going with that choice though.”

Alex laughed which made Charlotte laugh as well whilst she fixed her wings,

“Thanks, yeah myself and the others decided that we wanted to do something fun and simple, especially as there is also a large number of angels and some of the younger ones wanted to get involved. We might have also convinced some of the upper 5 and lower 6 boys to dress up as angels as well, so we had to go smart. Oh but to point out, my wings and halo are golden whilst everyone else has silver, have to make it sure that I’m the head angel. Looking good there, Charles.”

Charlotte gave a grin as they all saw Charles getting to his feet, looking slightly confused and starting to regret this but was still was clearly up for it. (well they didn’t have a backup option).

“Right perfect. Let's go.”

Charlotte smiled before making her way out of the classroom, the others following.

“Hey, you look cute.”

Alex smiled as he saw Lily standing backstage whilst Cate was fixing her wings; she smiled as she heard Alex’s voice.

“I would turn around, but then Cate would get annoyed with me. She and Charlie are taking it very seriously that all the angels’ wings are perfectly straight.”

Lily said before she felt Cate gently tapping her on the back before allowing Lily to spin round before she carefully made her way over to Alex, who wrapped his arm around her, avoiding her wings.

“I would kiss you, but I’d ruin my lipstick and the two running this side of the operation would get annoyed again.”

Lily smiled again, making all of them laugh.

* * *

“Right so you need to make sure that you don’t let glitter go everywhere, also the fact its gold makes it worse.”

Marcus rolled his eyes as he watched Guanyu fix Mick and Callum with a look. The pair were standing in jeans, sparkly gold t-shirts and glitter. It seemed that whoever had been in charge of the glitter had bought a shed ton of it, and it was being used generously. A point of this was that the angels had been covered in, and so had the two lower 6s turned into the star. However, it had been decided that it was easier having the two of them as the star, Mick sitting on Callum’s shoulder holding a large fabric star. Again the budget hadn’t been that well spent and Guanyu had basically turned into the main one doing costume for the lower 6s which he had taken very seriously.

Meanwhile, Juan and Jüri had been forced into the role of the innkeeper and his husband (they’d added the role and thought it was fitting). Marcus and Robert had also unwilling been forced in and were now stood wearing shirts, leggings, tutus, trainers, wings and halos. There was sliver glitter across their faces as well, and they also had slivery eye shadow. Christian had been part of the set design so was saved, and was stood in a black t-shirt and jeans watching the whole thing with amusement. There had been a lot of convincing to take the roles, and the only positive was that they at least had some purpose. Mick and Callum were a key element, and when Mick was on Callum’s shoulder, he was raised fairly high and therefore was able to get the star up quite high.

“Right I’d say you look good boys and we’re ready to go.”

Christian smiled getting death stares off the others; he and Giuliano had been smart in agreeing to help out with the more technical side. Giuliano was currently on the stage, making sure that the LED fairy lights were working along with Enzo and Gianluca who had agreed to help him with the lights. The other funny thing about this all was that Arthur, Gianluca’s lovely boyfriend and Charles’ brother had been forced to take the role of the donkey. It had been made even better as it was found in rehearsals, Charles had to jump onto Arthur’s back and sit on his shoulders, they’d also bought a fake baby bump because the leadership committee had decided to go for the ‘real feel’ and there weren’t brilliant alternatives. So yeah, it was all a little bit of a mess, but the good type. So it was with a heavy heart, the boys made their way to the stage where there were some of the Upper 6s standing there looking a little scared, but they smiled when they saw the growing number of younger kids.

“Right, perfect boys.”

Charlotte clapped her hands when she saw Marcus and Robert before carefully taking their hands and leading them over to stand next to the rest of the angels.

* * *

“Right so I think we’ve done a good job.”

Oscar gave a smile as he stood next to Logan and Fred after they had pushed the manger to the back of the stage behind the wooden stable door, there was a blanket underneath all the straw, so it was easy for Charles or Pierre to grab it and wrap the doll in. The doll was also in the manger as well. The three of them had decided to be part of stage design, and all had decided that it was a good idea.

“The stage is looking good; I think we’re good to go. Right, let's go backstage, and hopefully, we don’t know to be called in for an emergency, because I can’t work wonders fast.”

Logan sighed as he wrapped his arm around Oscar’s shoulders making Fred laugh,

“I’m sure it’ll be fine. Looking good there, Arthur.”

Fred shouted as the three saw Arthur making his way backstage, a pair of donkey ears hot glue gunned to a headband, brown jumper and jeans. He didn’t look impressed and the others, of course, found hilarious.

“I hate all of you right now.”

Arthur called as he walked past.

* * *

“So Joesph went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.”

Dino said as he stood at the front of the stage with a microphone, whilst he was stood next to Gabriele who then took the mic,

“He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.”

“I’m guessing whoever wrote the script had to put bible lines in.”

Sacha mouthed at Lando who nodded,

“You’d be amazed at how easy it was to google it.”

The pair then watched as the two S2 walked off stage before Pierre and Charles walked onto the stage, Pierre holding onto Charles’ hand, whilst Charles was resting his hand against the fake baby bump.

“So it seems that I have to go to Bethlehem, and because you are my future wife and also because your pregnant, it would be a good idea for you to come with me.”

Pierre said, looking at Charles.

“I don’t know who wrote the script, but they’ve jazzed it up a bit.”

Alex mouthed who was standing next to Lando and Lily, who was holding a script following along.

“I agree with that my love; however, the issue is that I now that I’m going to struggle with travelling because I’m heavily pregnant.”

Charles said, having warmed up to this and getting into the role.

“I know that, and because of this, I have spent some of my last wages on a donkey because I can’t afford a horse. Now let me go and get the donkey.”

Pierre said before he shuffled to the side of the stage whilst Arthur rolled his eyes before shuffling on stage, following Pierre.

“Ah, brilliant. Thank you, my love.”

Charles smiled as he gently stroked Arthur’s hair, desperately trying not to laugh, with Arthur trying not to push Charles.

Charles smiled as he gently stroked Arthur’s hair, desperately trying not to laugh, with Arthur trying not to push Charles.

“Right then, you ready to go?”

Pierre asked, also trying not to laugh as he walked forward and took Charles’ arm and the pair walked off the stage and Arthur following.

“After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before then until came to rest over the place where the child was.”

The S1 smiled before she shuffled off stage, clearly relieved that she hadn’t messed up her lines. It was at this point, Callum carefully walked forward, with Mick on his shoulders holding the star up, the pair deadly serious because the main aim was not to drop Mick. The pair then stood in the middle of the stage whilst Callum did a quick turn whilst Mick had the star held up high, before shuffling to the back of the stage. It was then followed by the three ‘wise men’ coming on stage, and turning around to see the ‘star’ before the three kneeled down in front of the ‘star’. 

“It seems that the star is guiding us to the birthplace of the baby that we have been told about.”

George said before getting nods and words of agreements from the other two. Before Callum shuffled forward with Mick shaking the star, some glitter falling out of it, Lando almost slipping, George reaching forward to grab his collar and pull him back up. Thankfully avoiding an injury which was good because nobody had any decent first aid knowledge and they really could do without any form of cut because glitter in open wounds was not good and there was already a ton of glitter everywhere. 

“Ok cool, right let's go angels.”

Charlotte said signally to the rest of the angels who had been standing on either side of the stage backstage before the other angels nodded and shuffled on stage after Charlotte, Cate and Lily. There was a surprisingly large number of boys as well. They gathered in a series of rows before the music started, much to the confusion of the audience.

“So I see they created a dance routine, wait of course they did.”

George sighed whilst the rest of the cast stood backstage watching the group of angels. Their attention was then brought back to the angels as Esteban was lifted up by Lance who wrapped his arms around his waist and spun him around. As the music finished the group of angels took a bow and walked off stage, whilst a few of them pushed forward the semi-successful created barn and manger to the front of the stage. Charles, Pierre and Arthur quickly ran onto the stage, the fake baby bump is gone, before they sat down by the manager, and grabbed the fake baby in the blanket.

It honestly was amazing that this thing was running smoothly and that they hadn’t been that many issues, it was also clear that the teachers fitting in the front rows were impressed, which given the cast and rest of the team, a bit of a boost. As the pair sat down, some of the angels made their way over and perched themselves upon the inbuild steps of the barn, successfully positioned, and so far nobody had fallen off, unlike in rehearsals where there had been a few falls.

“Thank you for all your kinds words, and here come the wise men who I have been told about.”

Pierre gave a smile as the audience’s attention was drawn to the three making their way over, carefully because there was a risk of somebody (Lando) slipping on the end of the robe, each with a box, wrapped. They had bought the boxes from storage warehouse so were decent enough.

“We three wise men offer you these gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.”

George gave a smile as he offered the box to Pierre and Charles, which they both took. In reality, there was nothing in the boxes because planning had forgotten about that bit, besides it didn’t matter that much.

* * *

“Well I must say, I wasn’t really sure about what to expect, and I know I don’t say this very often, but I’m very proud of all of you who got involved in the nativity, and I’ve also gotten some very nice emails from other members of staff who are also impressed so again, well done all of you.”

The sixth form was sat in sixth form assembly on Monday whilst Claire was standing at the front of the hall, looking pleasantly surprised for a change. She looked quite happy that she didn’t have to yell at any of them about something one of them had done, broken or caused some trouble.

“Right, so I want you guys to behave for the last week, I know that’s it's all Christmas, and there will be some festivities going on in your classes, but I also want you all to remember that you will be revising over the two weeks for your mocks. Understand?”

Claire asked before getting nods from the sixth form, which made Claire give a smile.

“Right off you go then, and I wish all of you and your family have good Christmas holidays.”

A few nods and smiles greeted her as the sixth form headed out of the assembly hall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So hope you all enjoyed and I’ve presented the amount of chaos that goes into a nativity.   
> Thanks   
> Scottie Dog


End file.
